On Gurugram’s ‘showpiece’ road, women fear to venture out after sunset

GURUGRAM: Supriya Maulick Mahajan was driving back after work. It was a smoky December night and quite late, around 11pm, when she noticed a Scorpio tailing her. The road was dark, lit only faintly by lights from adjacent highrise buildings. For a good kilometre or more, the men in the SUV kept following her. She did not dare slow down to make a call, fearing she might get waylaid.Then suddenly, they slowed down, perhaps distracted by something.
“I shudder at the thought of what might have happened that night,” Mahajan said on Friday as she recalled that experience.
This did not happen in some remote part of the city, or a desolate stretch of highway. It was right in new Gurgaon’s heart, in its most premier address: Golf Course Road. A road that has been going through a lengthy makeover into a showpiece 16-lane speedway. Yet, there is something basic it has not been able to provide thousands of commuters so far: streetlights.
As a result, women who live on or near Golf Course Road or those who work here say it’s a place they like to avoid after sundown. “The whole stretch from Bristol hotel till the Double Tree hotel does not have lights. It is pitch dark and a nightmare to drive on any time after dusk,” said Jasmine Singh, an architect whose office is on Golf Course Road.
Singh wondered how many incidents like the Bangalore molestations needed to happen before government agencies learnt their lessons and delivered on basic safety measures.
Renu Singh, who uses Golf Course Road to get to work every day, said, “The road is so dark that even walking from the parking lot to a complex or a restaurant is not safe.”
Kalpana Vishwanath, co-founder of Safetipin, a mobile app on women’s safety, said the road had the worst score in a survey on safety conducted last year. “The road has been in the same condition for over five years. The absence of lights in an area makes it many times more unsafe and scary for women,” said Vishwanath, adding authorities ought to have made arrangements for streetlights even while construction work was on.
Golf Course Road’s makeover is being carried out by Huda and DLF. Rapid Metro has also built an elevated corridor on it, which is due to start operations later this year. That will further increase footfall on the road, bringing the safety aspect further under the scanner.
Over the years, this is an issue that has repeatedly raised but no permanent solution has emerged. Asked about it, a Huda official on Friday refused to take ownership of the issue. Instead, the official said, “DLF is responsible for the road starting from Cyber City to Gurgaon. They have almost completed civil work and are in the process of starting electrical work as well.” DLF had not responded to a request for a comment at the time of publishing this report.