ECONOMYNEXT – Harassment in public transportation has been normalised in Sri Lanka, discouraging many victims from reporting incidents, a United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) analyst said.
“It’s so normalised, that nobody reports, very few reports,” Bimali Amarasekere, National Programme Analyst for Gender at UNFPA Sri Lanka said on a podcast conducted by a private tv channel.
“I shouldn’t say nobody, no, very few report, because we have about 4% to 5% that report to police.”
In 2023, about 300 incidents were reported to police, she said. “But the rest do not. You sometimes may tell a friend.”
According to the findings of a previous study commissioned by the UNFPA Sri Lanka over 90 percent of women using public transport in the island have been subjected to sexual harassment.
“We’ve created a culture in Sri Lanka that it’s laughed at, trivialised. That it’s something that every woman who goes in public transport has experienced during her life,” Ramani Jayasundara, attorney-at-law said on the same programme.
“Some people laugh at, especially men who don’t often get harassed, they laugh at you. They ask, ‘what trauma?’
“It’s a whole system that enables this to happen by trivialising and saying ‘That’s how it is’.”
A frequent response observed on public transport systems, especially buses, was that victims of sexual harassment chose to remain silent at the moment of harassment and after.
92% of the respondents never sought help from law enforcement when facing sexual harassment in public transport.
Amarasekere said men too were harassed by other men, but it’s a much smaller percentage.
This is also one big reason for low participation of women in employment, Fernando said. “A lot of women say going to office and coming back and the harassment in buses is too much.”
“When we take the labour force participation of men and women there’s a 40 percent gap, and it declined really further since the economic crisis,” Amarasekere said “If we could stop smoking in our public places and buses, why can’t we stop harassment?”
“I certainly don’t think that women are actually wanting to make police complaints, wanting to go to court, because that’s a traumatic experience in itself. They just want to be free of harassment in the past. So how do we get there?
“It’s also not about special treatment. It’s pointless having spaces for women, buses only for women, because they are good as temporary measures, but not in the long run,” Fernando said.
Bystander action can significantly improve the experience of using public transport, preventing sexual harassment in public spaces. “If you do notice, make some form of intervention and ask ‘Are you ok?’”
UNFPA encouraged women to report any forms of violence and harassment to the relevant authorities to achieve zero tolerance towards harassment. (Colombo/Jul18/2025)
Continue Reading
