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For women on the move

Delhi becomes the first city to have a woman-only floor in a five-star hotel. And with single women travellers increasing, it might spread around the country also

EVE'S OWN Only women housekeeping staff are allowed to ready a room for a lady guest at the Eva floor in New Delhi's ITC Maurya Sheraton hotel

The stories of a distant aunt still linger in the mind. Unmarried that she was, travelling alone was a related bane for her. Many small-town hotels across the country would not even allow her to check in alone. Shopping unescorted after sun down in a new place used to make her uneasy. Arriving late at a hotel (if at all it offered her a room) would invite cold stares from the staff. Sporting that she was, her presentation of such accounts would often make us giggle rather than feel sad about her state.

But looking back, one realises, that was no laughing matter indeed. Years later, women travelling alone in India still don't carry just their bags with them. They also carry a weight of danger. But the good news is, this has not deterred women from travelling alone to a new city. Increasingly. For a holiday, for work. All alone.

But the better news is, someone has taken notice of a single woman traveller's woes in the country's first city, Delhi, and is offering them a long-needed option — women-only rooms in hotels. Better still, a women-only hotel floor!

Eva floor

Yes, Delhi now claims to be the first Indian city to have a women-only hotel floor at ITC Maurya Sheraton. A five-star option for the well heeled, but a welcome move nevertheless. Named so femininely Eva, the floor has women butlers, a woman chef, safety equipments fitted in the rooms and on the floor. For the lady guests' safety and comfort.

Says Pratima Vasan, the hotel's PR Director: "We often felt the need for this concept as the number of single women travellers has increased. At this point in time, all the 14 Eva rooms are occupied, which shows how much are they in demand."

Not just international guests, even domestic women travellers, mostly on business, are Eva's regular guests. The upholstery, the toiletries, the bedspreads with floral prints, the folding ironing board and iron in the closet, the plasma screen TV, the choice of soft drinks and miniatures in the mini bar... all have visible feminine touches about them.

"Lady guests prefer these rooms particularly for their safety. So, we have video phones in each room to check from inside who's at the door. We screen all her calls if she wants it. We pick and drop her at the airport. And importantly, we bar men from entering this floor including the hotel staff. The lifts don't stop at the Eva floor unless you have the room key with you and you swipe it on the lift board," explains Ms. Vasan. For those willing to take a swig after a long day at work, the floor also has an option of a women-only lounge.

The Taj Mahal Hotel on Mansingh Road has no women-only enclosures yet, but has plans for one. However, it takes similar safety measures when it comes to women guests. "Our rooms have video phones, lady butlers, we screen her calls, pick her up from the airport, escort her from the porch to the room, brief her on the hotel's layout, offer her food according to her diet plan, keep a silk gown in addition to the bathrobe etc. This has been done keeping in mind the many single women checking in now," says Ruchita Sharma Bharadwaj, the PR Manager at The Taj Mahal Hotel. "Our pub Rick's has so often been quoted as the safest bar for women in the city. They can have an all-ladies evening there without trouble," she adds.

The Taj group's business hotel here, The Ambassador Hotel also has similar facilities for unescorted women travellers. The Oberoi, The Imperial, Hyatt Regency, The Grand, Marriot Welcomgroup... all now keep in mind such guests and offer them similar facilities providing a security net for a single woman traveller in an unsafe city like Delhi.

But her low-budget counterparts, with no deep pockets to afford a five-star stay, are still groping their way through snaky Paharganj lanes. Ignoring snide remarks, not so innocuous gestures and denial of an accommodation in some hotels at times. Says the manager at Hotel Mayur on Arakasan Road in Paharganj, "We don't deny rooms to a single woman but that is always dicey."

But much like a new surgery that gets so prohibitively expensive for the man on the street at the start, and then gradually becomes reachable, let's hope it is a matter of time till this new five-star operation too spreads down to the corner guesthouse.

Who knows, much as that aunt loved travelling alone, she might yet spring from her grave to have another go at it!

SANGEETA BAROOAH-PISHAROTY

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