‘We can’t let our guard down’: What getting around Delhi means for women students

For thousands of women like Kirti navigating DU’s scattered off-campus colleges, the daily commute involves an exhausting calculation: which route to take, whose arm to hold, and how early to return behind locked hostel gates. The problem is compounded by gaps in the last-mile connectivity, poorly lit stretches, and street harassment.

And the alleged gangrape of a 17-year-old in a South Delhi DDA park and a string of sexual assault cases involving minors have brought these concerns into sharp focus.

Public transport issues

The gaps are most apparent at the end of the college day. Day-scholars who rely on feeder buses said the services that bring them to college in the morning do not always run when classes end.

Ananya Shukla, a second-year student at a women’s college, said students have checked with drivers and found that buses from their areas leave as early as 6 am, but there is no corresponding service around 4 pm, when colleges usually wind up.

“At that hour, there are simply no buses available. They all head away in the opposite direction,” Ananya said.

She also pointed to the Delhi government’s DTC U-Special Bus Service, which was relaunched in August last year. “But there is no public data on how many women students are actually using these 26 buses, their occupancy or how frequently trips are cancelled,” said Ananya.

Left with few reliable options, students often walk through quiet stretches just to find an auto or an e-rickshaw.

The problems extend to the Delhi Metro. “I take the metro every day and you feel unsafe even inside the coaches,” said a first-year student from Lady Shri Ram College for Women. “This isn’t just about a particular college backlane or a park. Anywhere you go in this city, you are forced to be hypervigilant… we cannot let our guard down.”

A 2021 alumna of the same college said students had heard the same solutions for years. “The solution every time is more policing, more surveillance, telling women not to step out after dark. Sometimes, after crimes, we see more police personnel deployed on the roads, but to what end? It becomes about managing women. This has become their sanitised fix,” she said.

Scattered colleges

Unlike DU’s North Campus, where colleges and departments are clustered together, institutions across South, East and West Delhi are more spread out, often alongside busy arterial roads and residential neighbourhoods. In South Delhi’s Chanakyapuri, students say these gaps are particularly visible.

“Even in an area like Chanakyapuri, there are so many isolated stretches where police personnel are entirely missing,” said a South Campus student. “And across South Campus, even where ‘pink booths’ have been installed, there is no one inside them most of the time. You pass by, and they are completely deserted.”

Yakshna Sharma, an advocate practising at the Delhi High Court and a 2025 graduate of DU’s Campus Law Centre, gave another example. “Outside Laxmibai College, a public men’s washroom has been built directly against the campus boundary wall. Female students have repeatedly complained about men openly urinating, catcalling and exposing themselves while looking into the college ground. Yet there are no working CCTVs, no police presence and no functional booths,” she said.

Safety reduced to numbers

Amid these concerns, colleges have instructed women students to move out only in groups.

At the Rajkumari Amrit Kaur College of Nursing (RAKCON) in Lajpat Nagar IV, freshers who arrived on campus only days ago have already been instructed to follow rigid precautions.

“I just joined recently, but teachers have clearly warned us that whenever we need to step outside the campus, we must move only in groups. Even for small errands, like going to buy our textbooks, we made sure to go together,” said Ngawang Gatso, a first-year B.Sc Nursing student from Uttarakhand.

Tenzing Pamo, also a first-year student, said, “We stay inside the campus hostel, but stepping out is unavoidable for daily necessities. After the warning, we went in a group to get our books today. We definitely feel much more secure when we step outside together rather than going alone.”

Their batchmate Yangzom, who is from Tibet, said, “It has barely been a day since we arrived, and the very first instruction we received was about stepping out cautiously. With everything happening in the area, our seniors and faculty emphasised that no one should walk around alone outside the gates.”

A third-year student living in the college’s residential accommodation said the 6.30 pm curfew means she and other residents largely avoid stepping out after dark.