Bengaluru (Karnataka): In a bid to empower its women staff to be the custodians of their own safety, the Bengaluru Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) is preparing to teach it women employees, especially conductors, self-defence courses.
According to officials, the organisation will offer intensive training in martial arts like karate and judo and classes on gender sensitization, self-assertiveness, legal matters, counselling, and public speaking to its employees.
There are more than 3,000 women employees including conductors in BMTC. Officials said that a total of 42 hours of self-defence training will be held in a period of 21 days and each session will be 120 minutes long.
The BMTC, in a press release, said that sexual harassment of women in public spaces and at the workplace is daunting in magnitude as it plagues half of humanity. It said that the problem is undeniably acute, as women continue to face sexual harassment and other forms of gender-based violence on a daily basis.
