India: Inventors Develop GPS Underwear for Women to Combat Sexual Assaults

A group of students in India have come up with a range of hi-tech lingerie equipped with a global positioning system transmitter (GPS), to help women combat sexual assaults.

The engineering students who designed the special clothing, to be called Society Harnessing Equipment (SHE), hope to reduce the number of sexual crimes against women.

"The lingerie, laced with modules of global positioning system (GPS), global system for mobile communications (GSM) and also pressure sensors, is capable of sending shock waves of 3,800 kV as well as alerts to the girl's parents and police," one of the developers of the product, Manisha Mohan, told the Press Trust of India.

As soon as a would-be molester attacks, the GPS sensors in the lingerie are activated and send an emergency call to the police as well as to the potential victim's emergency contact numbers.

The hi-tech lingerie will provide "freedom from situations faced in buses and public places" for women who often face sexual assaults in many cities across India, said Mohan.

The inventors have approached India's National Institute of Fashion Technology to come up with a fabric that can be washable.

Mohan, who studies engineering in southern India, developed the underwear with two other students, Rimpi Tripathi and Neeladri Basu Pal.

The team plan to commercialise the product and are looking for investors. They say they already have a number of offers but nothing has been finalised.

The prototype has already won awards at science competitions.

The idea took shape soon after the Delhi gang-rape incident, which provoked outrage across India.

"After the Delhi gang-rape incident, and the rape of a Bangalore BPO worker, I felt women are being tortured in the name of safety. Henceforth, we decided to come up with something innovative which helps women protect themselves besides not being abandoned in the name of safety," said Mohan.