“Your father is too open-minded.” This is something people often tell 25-year-old Saarah Hameed Ahmed at wedding ceremonies and other gatherings, with disapproval writ large on their faces.
But she has learnt to shrug off such minor turbulences. It is not too hard for someone who steers people from one destination to another, thousands of feet above the ground almost every day.
Said to be Karnataka’s first Muslim woman pilot, Saarah has defied religious and gender stereotypes to become a First Officer in low-cost carrier SpiceJet. “My parents (her father is a professional photographer, mother a homemaker) always stressed on education,” says Saarah.
Having done her schooling and pre-university in the city, she wanted to pursue something that involved Physics and travelling. At 17, after mulling over astronomy, journalism and aeronautical engineering, a seminar by an Australian aviation academy set things on course.
She enrolled at a flying school in Florida, U.S., changed to another school mid-way after being unable to bear high costs, and managed to pass the course in 2009, being one of two Muslim women in the batch.
Saarah had to wait for a year after returning to India and gaining various licences (which again took about a year) before landing a job. Bengaluru to Bangkok is the longest journey she has flown so far.
“Some male passengers see me in the cockpit and ask me who the pilot is, but the women get excited. Men will dominate you if you allow them to,” she says, matter-of-factly.
