This airline has found a way to tackle sexual assault on planes

There are few things more FML-inducing than finding yourself sandwiched between two people on a flight.

But now one airline has decided to end that misery - at least for women.

India’s Vistara has introduced a new policy that will see women no longer having to sit in the middle of a row of seats.

The airline’s Women Flyer service allows solo travelling women to "pre-select their preferred seats”. If a female traveller does not select a seat, the airline will only ever assign a window or aisle seat to her upon check-in.

She will also be offered baggage and transport assistance on arrival.

Uniformed staff greet female passengers at baggage reclaim and can book airport-authorized taxis for them, escorting them right up to the taxi rank.

Sanjiv Kapoor, Vistara’s chief strategy and commercial officer, described the measure, external as “a sincere effort to ensure peace of mind of our women customers".

In a 2016 YouGov poll for ActionAid UK, external, 79% of Indian women reported having experienced harassment and abuse in public. The British Transport Police has just released figures showing the number of reports of sexual offences on UK trains, including the London Underground, has doubled in the last five years.

Vistara's Women Flyer service isn’t the first time women-only travel spaces have been used as a means of reducing sexual harassment.

In India, there are women-only buses, trains, external, and last year, a scooter taxi service, operated by women, for women, was set up in Gurgaon, near New Delhi.

Other countries have experimented with similar arrangements, with Brazil, Thailand, Iran and Egypt among those operating women-only train or subway carriages. Reception to these initiatives has been mixed., external

In 2015, the Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, raised the possibility of piloting separate carriages in Britain.

Corbyn said, external, “Some women have raised with me that a solution to the rise in assault and harassment on public transport could be to introduce women-only carriages.

"My intention would be to make public transport safer for everyone from the train platform, to the bus stop, on the mode of transport itself.

"However, I would consult with women and open it up to hear their views on whether women-only carriages would be welcome – and also if piloting this at times and on modes of transport where harassment is reported most frequently would be of interest.”

His comments received criticism.

Nicky Morgan, the Education Secretary and Women’s Minister at the time said she felt, external"very uncomfortable" about the idea.

"It seems to me not to tackle the issue, which is that women should feel safe and be free from harassment on public transport."

The UK has had ‘ladies-only’ train carriages before. They operated between 1874 and 1977, and were originally introduced in response to a series of highly publicised attacks on women travellers.

A 2014 YouGov/Reuters poll, external found that 45% of British women would support separate train carriages today.