Women-only buses have been introduced in Malaysia in an attempt to stop sexual harassment, it was reported Thursday.
According to a report by the New Straits Times, the Rapid Lady Bus service will operate at busy times on certain routes in Kuala Lumpur, the capital of the Muslim-majority country.
Datuk Hussain, the chief operating officer of RapidKL Bus, told the paper in a statement that the services had been brought in "based on feedback received from our customers, especially females, who shared with us their discomfort during peak-hour travels."
The move follows the introduction of women-only train cars — painted pink — by the Malaysian Railway in April, the news agency AFP reported.
'A pampered lot'
Passenger Poovan Kaur, 63, told the New Straits Times that she would feel safer "not because I do not trust men, but for someone my age, it's hard to fight for space during peak hours."
"I hope men will not think we are a pampered lot. They must admit that they are bigger and it gets uncomfortable when the buses are packed," another traveler, Nazilah Adnan, 41, said.
Boys under 12 are allowed on the women-only buses if accompanied by a female, the newspaper said.
In other moves designed to segregate men and women, AFP said there were plans to establish a waterfall site for female tourists to bathe in Terengganu state, citing news reports.
The news agency also said laws requiring men and women to stand in different lines in shops in Kelantan had been introduced, but had not been strictly enforced.
AFP said more than 60 percent of Malaysia's 28 million people are Muslim Malays with large ethnic Chinese and Indian minorities.