Unreported World - 4oD

Series 2013 Episode 6

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7.30PM Fri 17 May 2013 Channel 4

Bangladesh is one of the most dangerous places in the world to drive a car. Reporter Clemency Burton-Hill and director Elizabeth C Jones take to the roads of Dhaka with a group of young women who are learning to be professional drivers against extraordinary odds: on top of dreadful drivers, teeming traffic and huge potholes, these learners are battling entrenched social taboos as they try to enter a profession almost entirely dominated by men.

Inside the residential driving schoo run by Bangladesh charity BRAC, the young women - many of whom have come from difficult circumstances - live, sleep, eat and study together, swapping life stories and forging friendships. Their driving tuition, both in the classrooms and on the roads, is intense: 8am to 6pm every day except Fridays.

Dhaka has appalling traffic and more than 20,000 people die on Bangladesh's roads every year. Before the women get anywhere near the wheel, however, one of the first issues they are taught about is 'gender sensitivity'. As female drivers, prejudice, discrimination and abuse are as likely to await them as potholes, traffic jams and exhaust fumes.

Twenty-year-old Mafuza was forced to leave school when she was 14 and marry a man she'd never met. Having divorced her husband after he allegedly mistreated her, she has retreated back to her village with her two-year-old daughter.

Nobody else in her village drives a car, but she dreams of becoming a professional driver to provide her parents with much more income. She also hopes to be an inspiration to other women in the village by proving that women - even young, divorced women - can be equal to men, and can forge an independent livelihood despite the prevailing social taboos.

Twenty-one-year-old Konika claims she was so badly beaten by her husband that she lost her baby during the ninth month of her pregnancy. Now divorced, Konika is making good progress, but worries that she can't stop her legs from shaking whenever she drives.

Competition for jobs at the end of the driving course is fierce. The director of the driving school tells Burton-Hill that of the 60 women who have already passed through the driving course and been awarded professional licenses, only 16 have since found employment as drivers.

While the Unreported World team is there, political parties call strikes almost non-stop, bringing the country to a virtual standstill. Vehicles are targeted during strikes, which means the apprentice drivers can't practise driving on the open road.

The female students also face the wrath of religious extremists who are marching on Dhaka with a list of demands including keeping women at home and banning free mixing of men and women.

Inside the gates of the driving school, the girls are relatively sheltered from the political turmoil taking place on the streets - at least for now. Mafuza passes the tests and is allowed to drive the Unreported World team for a short distance in her village.

Before entering the village she crashes into a rickshaw driver and drawing extra attention from a fascinated, bemused local crowd. When she finally makes it home in one piece, her family are astonished to see their daughter, mother and sister driving a car. Her father, looking a little shell shocked, tells the team he's very proud of his daughter.

As the Unreported World team leaves Bangladesh, it's clear that while some progress is being made by these young female pioneers, women still face many challenges, both on the roads and beyond.

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