The "grrring" vehicles roar fiercely as manicured hands tenderly, yet expertly, release the clutch levers. Revving up the engines, they ride straight into the hearts of City guys on their single cylinder flying machines.

The class came into being a few years ago when the daddies of today were in college. The count was limited then. You would find an Army officer's daughter in Sector 37, the "tomboy" of Sector 15 whizzing around or the Bullet riding student of Panjab University's mass communication department. You even remembered the registration numbers then.

"Those were the days when guys turned their heads in anticipation at the soft purring of the approaching mopeds on the aashiqi ghera," recalls Navdeep Sandhu, an advocate. "Mopeds were soon replaced by `kinees'. But the guys never turned to look for oncoming bikes. They were for guys, strictly".Today you are sure to overlook the young miss in hip huggers and a floral T-shirt, shifting gears with an ankle booted foot, if you do not look back in expectation.

"Bikes are no more the lone prerogative of men," says Rangita Singh, a young psychologist. "They are the wheels of freedom for sassy girls on the fast lane of contemporary life; riding them is a graduation from Barbie dolls to the steely splendours".

Explaining the changing trend, a sociologist, Rinky Sharma, says: "It is an intense expression of strength by the once thought to be weak sex....It's a striving to establish distinctiveness in a culture where women have left behind the protective seclusion of domesticity after discarding the customary salwar kameez".

The psychologues may interpret this as an assertion of individuality, even an "attention attracting tactic", but City maidens insist a hard and rough ride gives them the thrill that adds passion to life.

"On bikes you feel free," says university student Ruchi Malhotra. "A triumphant conviction of being invincible, as though in control of the universe. I feel like a Street Hawk every time I cut along the steep curves."Ruchi learned to manoeuvre a Yamaha RX 100 -- her boy friend's, of course -- when she was in plus II. Now she goes for a spin on a Yezdi, a Rajdoot 350, just any bike for that matter.

Others, with several months, even years of plying experience, are veterans. Their parents do not mind, either. If the pampered young miss can don jeans, jive at the late night parties, or join the armed forces, she can also ride along on the mean machines.