Women two-wheeler riders in India face all kinds of problems when they ride on the roads, the primary one being the road itself. In a study conducted by the Tvarra Research Centre, the research arm of Tvarra, India's women-first helmet and safety brand, the most widely shared problem faced by women two-wheeler riders is not behaviour, equipment or harassment. It is the road itself. Around 82.3% of women riders cite poor road conditions as a top concern — the single highest incidence of any measure we recorded.
The Tvarra Research Centre surveyed 1,018 women across India — 542 who ride two-wheelers and 476 who travel as pillion passengers — about how they actually experience mobility. Nearly three-quarters say larger vehicles disregard them. Nearly two-thirds are wearing certified helmets that do not fit them properly. And among passengers, a group almost entirely absent from Indian road-safety policy, 61.1% have nothing secure to hold and 47.5% rarely wear a helmet at all.
The state of the road
Ask a woman in India what stops her riding freely, and she rarely names one thing. She names the road she rides on, the vehicles that crowd her, the helmet that does not fit, and the person she carries behind her. This report holds all four in view at once, because the women who answered our survey live all four at once.
Across 1,018 respondents — 542 who ride and 476 who travel pillion — a consistent picture emerges. The problems are not exotic or rare. They are ordinary, daily and widely shared, which is precisely why they have been so easy to overlook. When four in five riders name the same problem, it stops being a complaint and becomes a condition of the road.
Sixty per cent of all respondents are drawn from Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Kerala — states where helmet compliance runs markedly higher than the national picture, which means every helmet-related figure in this volume should be read as conservative rather than alarming.
On a two-wheeler, road surface is not a comfort issue. It is a control issue. A pothole taken at speed, a broken edge, loose gravel on a turn — each is a moment when a rider can lose the machine, and each is more consequential for a lighter rider carrying a passenger. Infrastructure is where the largest number of women meet the largest risk.
After the road comes the traffic on it. 72.7% of women riders report that larger vehicles disregard them — cutting in, crowding, overtaking without room. This is the second-most-common experience in the study, and it compounds the first: a rider already managing a poor surface must also manage drivers who behave as if she is not there.
The pattern matters because it is not an accident of one bad junction. When nearly three-quarters of riders describe the same treatment, it describes a road culture, not a set of incidents.
Personal safety: harassment on the move
A certified helmet that is not worn protects no one. This is the quiet failure at the centre of the equipment story. Nearly 63% of women riders — 62.9% — report problems with fit or comfort, and comfort is not a luxury: it is the difference between a helmet worn every day and one left on a hook.
The problem is sharper still for passengers. Among pillion riders, 58.6% find helmets uncomfortable and 47.5% say they rarely wear one at all, with pillion helmet usage sitting at just 52.5%. A helmet designed without women in mind is not a neutral object; it is a barrier to the very protection it promises.
If comfort determines whether protection is worn, then design is a safety intervention, not a styling exercise. The findings point to a plain brief: helmets sized and shaped for a wider range of heads, weighted so they do not strain the neck on long rides, ventilated for Indian heat, and designed to accommodate — rather than ignore — hair, which 43.9% of pillion passengers raise as a concern.
The most overlooked population in Indian road safety is the person on the back seat. She has no control over speed, braking or route — and, in six cases out of ten, nothing secure to hold. 61.1% of pillion passengers report having nothing secure to grip, which turns every sudden stop into a problem of physics she cannot influence.