Watch: The Unsung Postwomen Who Deliver Chitthis Across Mumbai

Mumbai’s General Post Office currently employs 10 postwomen against 103 men.

The General Post Office in Mumbai currently employs 10 postwomen amidst 103 postmen.

(Photo: The Quint)

Ever been told you couldn’t do something because it’s a “man’s job”? It’s time to shut the haters. For Women’s Day, we present you stories about women who’re acing conventionally male-dominated jobs and smashing ‘StreeOtypes’ along the way!

Meet Mumbai's postwomen.

Manisha Daneshwar Sale, Parvati Kalidas Gohil and Viru Madhav Jitiya are three women who have been hired by Mumbai’s General Post Office and have been delivering snail mail since 1984. Currently, the GPO employs 10 postwomen against 103 men. A few others work on a daily wage basis.

In 1984, Sale, Gohil and Jitiya each got a call for an interview for the position from Mantralaya. They were among the first women to be approached for the job. At the time, they were offered a salary of Rs 300, and today they make around Rs 50,000 a month. Most of the postwomen are the highest earning members of their family.

The women initially faced varying levels of resistance from their families considering their job would require them to travel door to door delivering mail. But the pay and stability of a government job were hard to dismiss entirely.

My husband had said that my wife has a government job so it’s good. He didn’t have a job. He was in the private sector but he was thankful for my job as my money would run the house and then he decided to get married to me. He was very poor; he didn’t have anything. All the wedding expenses were handled by me.

Manisha Daneshwar, Postwoman

My mother had supported me back then although my father had said that I should not go because in our times women were not allowed to go out. That is why I was a little scared. But once it became a routine, then the fear was gone.

Viru Madhav Jitiya, Postwoman

My husband had said no because back then, no women use to go out to work. I had not told anyone from my family about my job. They would have all said, ‘This is not a traditional job. How is she roaming on the streets?’ All this while they thought I had a desk job at the post office. After 15-20 years I told everyone that I was a postwoman. Everyone knows now but all these years it had been a secret.

Parvati Kalidas Gohil

When asked about discrimination in at the workplace, they said that every postman in the office was like their brother and that they worked like a family.

“The whole post office is like a family,”says postwoman Manisha Sale.The Quint

Postman remains the official term for a person who delivers mail, although the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information Technology has asked the postal department to change the term to the gender neutral ‘post person’.

Camera: Sanjoy Deb
Assistant Camera: Gautam Sharma
Editor: Veeru Krishan Mohan
Assistant Producer: Prakriti Arya
Producer: Bilal Jaleel