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| The First Flight: Not Much Change Since? Picture Courtesy: Wikipedia |
This incident means that airlines sure know how to act when there is a violation while flying. But why is it different when the violence is gender based? You do know that women get sexually harassed on flights, don’t you? Well, they do. In that case, however, there is absolutely no mechanism which ensures justice. Let’s take a look at what has been done by airlines to combat sexual harassment. It shouldn’t be difficult, because some of the harassers are public figures. Oh, Gaikwad isn’t the only person who has been a dick on flight? No.
The President of America who likes to grab women by their pussies is still the President of America. For him, bragging about sexual harassment is ‘locker room banter’. Jessica Leeds is one of the women came out to speak about how she was sexually harassed by Trump. In an incident which had happened more than 30 years ago, she said that he had grabbed her breasts and had tried to put his hand up her skirt while flying. What an example to set to world leaders. Where is the airways ban on this man? Oh wait, he has a flight exclusively for himself.
Airlines were quick to send this Muslim man out of the flight when he was only uttering the name of his god in the flight. By that logic, shouldn’t the utterance of ‘Ram’ and its derivatives be banned too? But wait, that’s a hindu god and Trump loves the hindu. By Trump’s standards being a sexual assaulter might soon become one of the criteria for entering politics. That, I should say will come in handy for a big band of politicians in India. Do airlines even know what sexual harassment is, or what to do when it happens on flights?
Conversations I had with airlines and passengers clearly say ‘no’.
Roshni, a frequent flyer told me about an incident which had happened 8 years ago in which her co-passenger was reeking of alcohol and she was extremely uncomfortable sitting next to him. She had repeatedly asked the air hostess to kindly give her another seat but was told that it was impossible. The man was staring at her private parts and once got up to go to the loo. Roshni was very uncomfortable with him crossing her and so got up and stood aside, making way for him. Later the man started drinking in spite of being drunk already. The air hostess, Roshni said, was very ‘nice’ to her and kept 'checking on' her.
This looks like a clear case of lack of proper training because in this case, Roshni should have been allotted a seat change the first time she asked for it when she found out that the man reeked of alcohol. So I went in search of details of training given to employees and realized the truth.
There is absolutely no training given to employees as to what measures to take when there is sexual harassment on flights. Rajni worked with airlines for 12 years. 3 years at Jet Airways and 8 in Kingfisher. She said that training was given to handle situations where passenger safety is under threat. On 10 she said she would give an 8 for this kind of training and 2 for training on sexual harassment because there hardly was any. Sheetal, who worked with Kingfisher confirmed the same. Both said that staff generally used their discretion to handle such situations. The staff were trained how to hold a misbehaving passenger to his seat winding a belt over him but whether or not sexual harassment fell in that category of misbehaviour would entirely be the staff/captain’s prerogative.
This policy of airlines made zero sense to me and it became clearer when I spoke to another female staff who has worked as cabin crew and cabin supervisor at Jet Airways and Emirates. She said she couldn’t reveal her name because Emirates had a non-disclosure policy regarding their training details.
While saying that it was common that lewd comments were passed she also added that it was usually handled by the women themselves. Some of the comments which were passed by passengers and co-workers were like ‘Indian women have big asses, their colour is exotic and sexy’. When I pointed out that this was blatant sexual harassment she told me that it was ‘probably horrible in a society where we are shy about our body and colour. [In] most of the western countries people are pretty open about their sexuality or body. In that case these comments can be taken as compliments’.
This policy of airlines made zero sense to me and it became clearer when I spoke to another female staff who has worked as cabin crew and cabin supervisor at Jet Airways and Emirates. She said she couldn’t reveal her name because Emirates had a non-disclosure policy regarding their training details.
While saying that it was common that lewd comments were passed she also added that it was usually handled by the women themselves. Some of the comments which were passed by passengers and co-workers were like ‘Indian women have big asses, their colour is exotic and sexy’. When I pointed out that this was blatant sexual harassment she told me that it was ‘probably horrible in a society where we are shy about our body and colour. [In] most of the western countries people are pretty open about their sexuality or body. In that case these comments can be taken as compliments’.
You see what I mean. If I had faced such a comment, and finding it extremely improper, [May be because of my ‘culture’ like she said or because I am not ‘open’ enough] I would approach someone like her on my flight. But it might not be treated as an emergency situation. I would be told that it is not serious and just a case of a ‘culture gap’ or that it is even a compliment! For my complaint to be considered, I would have to be giving birth to a child or having a heart attack because these two are situations which are treated as emergency.
Sheetal was one of the staff who was quick to act when she faced harassment from a passenger. The man had clicked her picture from behind. While Sheetal was returning she saw her picture on the passenger’s screen and was infuriated. She immediately reported it to the captain and also questioned the passenger. She also confiscated his phone. This sort of behaviour, however, is not possible from everyone’s side and it is nobody’s fault, least of all, the victim’s. Sheetal confirmed that she had not even heard of a body for handling sexual harassment complaints in airlines and even other companies she had worked for. Sheetal had ventured into business after her job as Assistant Base Manager at airlines. ‘If there has to be an HR, a sales department, there has to be a sexual harassment department.’ she said, emphatically.Hiba Mariyam who did not wish to reveal her employer’s name spoke of elaborate training which was given them. This too, did not include any situation of sexual harassment but had elaborate mention of safety threats like evacuation in 90 seconds etc. ‘These are mandatory for all cabin crew and are evaluated by DGCA [Directorate General of Civil Aviation] approved trainers and we have to score above 90/100 in all. All cabin crew have cleared those exams and then only get the license or approval from DGCA to fly. The training lasts for more than 45 days. It differs from airline to airline,’ she said. Isn’t it time DGCA included 90/100 in a separate training for sexual harassment cases?
I wrote to DGCA asking if they had a sexual harassment policy and received no reply. The same with four other airlines including Air India. Interestingly, one of those days, RN Choubey, Secretary, Civil Aviation made an announcement that passengers who exhibited unruly behaviour will be banned from flying with immediate effect. ‘Airline can ban the passenger from flying immediately,but the passenger won’t come on national no-fly list immediately,’ he said. Punishment for unruly behavior has been divided into 3 categories. Level 1 includes disruptive behaviour like physical gestures etc and the ban will be for 3 months. Level 2 is physically abusive behaviour like pushing, kicking, sexual harassment etc and the punishment 6 months. Level 3 is life threatening behaviour with a punishment of 2 years or more. That’s great sir, but excuse me, who formulated these vague categories and how on earth does this address sexual harassment among employees? I spoke to a pilot from Jet Airways and learnt this: The captain decides what is to be done. So what about the instances where captains engage in sexual harassment and who told you that sexual harassment is always physically abusive?
Rajni had called it out once. She remembered how once a pilot had said on Passenger Address System (a microphone) that he wanted to see the ass of all crew in the cockpit. She said that nobody complained because they knew nothing would happen. Why is that? I asked, and that’s when she told me how most airlines value their pilots over other employees due to the money involved in training and recruiting a new pilot. In another instance, the pilot had called Rajni to the cockpit and asked her out for dinner repeatedly. ‘I was still taking it lightly and I said, captain I hope you know I am married. I am busy with my husband. He said ‘husband ke saath to tu har raat jaati hai ek baar mere saath aa’. [you go with your husband every night come with me just for one night]. ‘And that is the time I lost it and I told him that this is the first and the last time you are talking to me like this,’ she explained. She thinks that might have pissed him off because while landing when she reported to him [it’s procedure in all flights], he said ‘SHUT UP’ to her over the microphone.
Did she complain? Yes, but she also said that, ‘so you can complain. But they will not do anything about it. Because even if you resign today, I am a crew. I earn maybe 70-80000 and there are thousands of crew waiting to be recruited. To recruit a captain, the airlines has to offer them a specific training which costs them lakhs of rupees. And this captain who kind of made objectionable remarks at me was a trainer. He was one of the senior pilots from Air India. He had a history of sexually harassing a couple of cabin crew there but he was a very senior guy. So I fought with him on board after passengers had left. There was proof that he abused me.’ She also found it strange that even after checking the blackbox which records the conversations in the last thirty minutes of the flight, they got no proof when in fact, in her case, all the proof that was required was right there. The only assurance she got was that she would never be asked to work with him as the captain.
Everyone remembers the girl who took on the man who harassed her on Indigo flight and the video she took of him. The post went viral and the incident got a lot of attention. But is the man banned from Indigo Airlines? That is another of the questions the airlines refused to answer. In Gaikwad’s case, other airlines joined Air India’s protest by saying that they too will not allow him to fly. Would they have done the same with a sexual offender? We have no precedents for sure.
Whenever I go on reporting and ask questions to people, deep inside, I hope they do not have any incident of assault in their lives. Sadly, like other instances, most of the women I spoke to were subjected to harassment. Except one of my colleagues. When I asked if she had had any experience like that she shook her head and I was happy. Till she added ‘Not yet’. We shared a cigarette in silence.
-kunjila mascillamani
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