Pepper sprays, knives, a hammer, a pair of scissors, a puncture kit and a coil of rope. Finding a bag full of these tucked into a corner of a car could be misleading. And with a woman at the wheel, it could maybe even make for a Gone Girl sequel. However, this story about three women is less gory. The hammers and knives are just for self-defence, they confirm.
Sunita Dugar, an entrepreneur and candid photographer, Parneet Sandhu, an employee of a U.S.-based company and Neetha Jegan, who works as a manager, travelled 5,000 kilometres on the road from Kanyakumari to Kashmir for Independence Day this year. It wasn’t a crazy spur-of-the-moment decision, but something that sedimented over months after they read about Roshni Sharma a year ago. “She is a biker who did road trips alone. We were quite inspired after reading about her, and thought why don’t we do something similar?” says Sunita.
With this thought that wouldn’t let her rest, she spoke to her husband, who said ‘Go for it’. Parneet knew her parents would be a bundle of nerves if she broke the news about the trip. So she tweaked the ‘three women’ bit of the story to a ‘group of adventure lovers’. Neetha foresaw the fun the trip promised, and made a last-minute entry. All set, the three, who have always been the shotguns on long drives, wanted to take one small test to prove to themselves that they wouldn’t be disasters on wheels. A 1,500-km trip to Wayanad and back confirmed it.
On August 8, when the sun dipped and crows found their way back to their nests, the three left Kanyakumari. They saw windmills, like Lego pieces, whiz by in the backdrop of small hillocks. They halted at Dindigul for the night, and rose at dawn to start their journey again. “We made it a point to cover at least 800 km per day,” says Sunita. With this target set, it was hard for the travelling divas, as they call themselves, to stop for shopping or any kind of recreation, apart from photography. They sought help from H.V. Kumar of the HiVayKing Club for routing navigation, mobilising help in case of maintenance issues enroute and hotel bookings.
Over the next five days, clear blue skies and green lands replaced the windmills, in Karnataka. Slowly, the green turned brown in Andhra Pradesh. Next day, they were again on a carpet of green, with farmers tilling the land, sweat glistening on their shoulders and neck. From Central India, they moved upwards. “As we reached Delhi, we couldn’t see the sky. It was all grey because of the pollution. It was only after we entered Punjab, that the sky was clearer with sarson and ganne ka khet on both sides. And then came the best of all — the greener, and more colourful belt of Kashmir,” says Sunita.
A few kilometres before Kashmir, they found themselves stuck on a mountain road because of a landslide the previous night. “We couldn’t move because of the traffic. A senior police personnel approached us on noticing the TN registration on the car’s number plate. Knowing that we were three women doing this trip, we were asked to move forward in the line. We were escorted by convoys to Kashmir!”
They reached Srinagar on August 14. Three women amid a crowd of Army men. “They were all around, with their AK 47s. It was a different experience. However, when we went to Dal lake, it was just like any other tourist spot, bustling with people,” she says.
While the women had their moments of fear — crossing the dark, thick woods of the Pench National Park, driving by a region in Jhansi infamous a century ago for thuggee, getting stranded in Gwalior when their car broke down, stopping for lunch in the Chambal surrounded by men with revolvers in their pockets, losing phone connectivity for 24 hours in Srinagar — the journey is something they are ready to repeat again.
Next up, is a trip across the breadth of the country. “Ultimately, we want to be a Roshni Sharma for someone. We want to spread the message that with proper planning, it is completely safe for women to take a trip on their own,” says Sunita.
Follow their journey on their Facebook page — The travelling divas.
