Almost each girl in India has a narrative of sexual harassment that came about in crowded public areas – when somebody fondled her breasts or pinched her backside, elbowed her within the chest or rubbed himself towards her.

To hit again at their predators, girls used no matter they’d – as an example, as school college students commuting within the overcrowded buses and trams within the jap metropolis of Kolkata many years in the past, my associates and I used our umbrellas.

Many of us additionally stored our nails lengthy and sharp to scratch straying arms; others used the sharp heels of their stilettos to hit again at males who would benefit from the group to press their penises into our backs.

Many others used a way more efficient software – the ever present security pin.

Since its invention in 1849, security pins have been utilized by girls world wide to carry totally different bits of clothes collectively, or to take care of a sudden wardrobe malfunction.

They have additionally been utilized by girls globally to combat again towards their harassers, even draw blood.

A number of months again, a number of girls in India took to Twitter to admit that they at all times carried a pin of their purses or on their particular person, and that it was their weapon of option to combat perverts in crowded areas.

One of them – Deepika Shergill – wrote about an incident when she really used it to attract blood. It occurred on a bus she repeatedly took to commute to the workplace, Ms Shergill advised the BBC. The incident came about many years in the past, however she nonetheless remembered the tiniest particulars.

She was about 20 and her tormenter was in his mid-40s, he at all times wore a gray safari (a sort of two-piece Indian swimsuit in style with authorities employees) and open-toed sandals, and carried an oblong leather-based bag.

“He would always come and stand next to me, lean over, rub his groin in my back, and fall over me each time the driver applied the brakes.”

In these days, she says she was “very timid and didn’t want to draw attention to myself”, so she suffered in silence for months.

But one night, when he “began masturbating and ejaculated on my shoulder”, she determined it was sufficient.

“I felt defiled. On reaching home, I showered for a really long time. I didn’t even tell my mother what had happened with me,” she mentioned.

“That night I couldn’t sleep and even thought about quitting my job, but then I started thinking about revenge. I wanted to do bodily harm to him, to hurt him, to deter him from doing this to me ever again.”

The subsequent day, Ms Shergill swapped her flat footwear with stilettos and boarded the bus, armed with a security pin.

“As soon as he came and stood next to me, I got up from my seat and crushed his toes with my heels. I heard him gasp, and felt a lot of joy. Then I used the pin to puncture his forearm and quickly exited the bus.”

Although she continued to take that bus for an additional yr, she mentioned that was the final she noticed of him.

Ms Shergill’s story is surprising, however not uncommon.

A colleague in her 30s narrated an incident when a person repeatedly tried to grope her on an in a single day bus between the southern cities of Cochin and Bengaluru (Bangalore).

“Initially I shook him off, thinking it was accidental,” she mentioned.

But when he continued, she realised that it was deliberate – and the protection pin she had used to maintain her scarf in place “saved the day”.

“I pricked him and he withdrew, but he kept trying again and again and I kept trying to prick him back. Finally, he withdrew. I’m happy that I had the safety pin, but I feel silly that I didn’t turn around and slap him,” she says.

“But when I was younger, I was wary that people wouldn’t support me if I raised an alarm,” she provides.

Activists say it’s this concern and disgrace that almost all girls really feel that emboldens molesters and makes the issue so widespread.

According to an online survey of 140 Indian cities in 2021, 56% of ladies reported being sexually harassed on public transport, however solely 2% went to the police. A overwhelming majority mentioned they took motion themselves or selected to disregard the state of affairs, typically transferring away as a result of they did not wish to create a scene, or have been apprehensive about escalating the state of affairs.

More than 52% mentioned they’d turned down training and job alternatives due to “feelings of insecurity”.

“Fear of sexual violence impacts women’s psyche and mobility more than the actual violence,” says Kalpana Viswanath, who co-founded Safetipin, a social organisation working to make public areas protected and inclusive for ladies.

“Women start imposing restrictions on themselves and it denies us equal citizenship with men. It has a much deeper impact on women’s life than the actual act of molestation.”

Ms Viswanath factors out that harassment of ladies is not only an Indian drawback, it is a international concern. A Thomson Reuters Foundation survey of 1,000 women in London, New York, Mexico City, Tokyo and Cairo confirmed that “transport networks were magnets for sexual predators who used rush-hour crushes to hide behaviour and as an excuse if caught”.

Ms Viswanath says girls in Latin America and Africa have advised her that they carry security pins too. And the Smithsonian Magazine reports that within the US, girls used hatpins even within the 1900s to stab males who bought too shut for consolation.

But regardless of topping a number of international surveys on the size of public harassment, India does not appear to recognise it as an enormous drawback.

Ms Viswanath says that is partly as a result of poor reporting means it does not get mirrored in crime statistics, and due to the affect of in style cinema that teaches us that harassment is only a method of wooing girls.

In the previous few years although, Ms Viswanath says, issues have improved in a number of cities.

In the capital Delhi, buses have panic buttons and CCTV cameras, extra feminine drivers have been inducted, coaching classes have been organised to sensitise drivers and conductors to be extra conscious of feminine passengers, and marshals have been deployed on buses. Police have additionally launched apps and helpline numbers which girls can use to hunt assist.

But, Ms Viswanath says, it’s not at all times an issue of policing.

“I think the most important solution is that we have to talk more about the issue, there has to be a concerted media campaign that will drill into people what’s acceptable behaviour and what’s not.”

Until that occurs, Ms Shergill and my colleague and hundreds of thousands of Indian girls must preserve their security pins useful.