TOI

TimesView Increasingly, Ola and Uber drivers are behaving like Bengaluru’s auto drivers: unpredictable, boorish and even criminal. Safety was once their USP, but recent incidents of assault, sexual harassment and route diversion have only served to destroy the trust cab aggregators once inspired in the public. Sadly, the drivers are also banking on local support to bully customers. The aggregators should introduce more checks to ensure that rides are safer, choose drivers after stringent checks and train them. If such incidents continue, the government must step in to rein in a system which promised a lot but is faltering on safety.

Driver barred, Uber tells victim

Uber bars driver

BENGALURU: Abir Chandra is the fourth victim of alleged cabbie rage in a week. Chandra, 30, a sales manager with a global FMCG company, was allegedly assaulted by an Uber driver and left bleeding on the road with a broken nose, two fractured fingers and multiple injuries on his face and head.“On July 6, I was hit by an Uber driver and left bleeding on the road with a broken nose, two fractured fingers of my right hand and multiple injuries to the face and head. Although I lodged a complaint with the jurisdictional Suddaguntepalya police the same day, I’ve been unable to follow up with cops as I was under treatment,” Chandra told. While the injuries on his face have healed, his fingers need more time.Police, however, said they have received complaints from both the passenger and the driver, alleging that both have been assaulted. “While the passenger stated that he was assaulted by the driver, the latter accused the passenger of verbally abusing and then assaulting him. It is a case of verbal argument turning physical,” a police officer said. The driver told the police that the passenger pressured him to speed up and when he did not, ridiculed him by saying that the car was moving like a bullock cart.Chandra has been in Bengaluru for only six months, and regularly commutes by cab. On July 6, he had booked an UberPool — a shared service — and his request was accepted by Anush R, driving KA-05-AG-4360.Chandra, who was alone in the cab, asked the driver to “drive a bit faster as he had guests waiting at home”, and claims the driver, for whom he had waited about half an hour, was already upset when he arrived to pick him up.“I was returning home to Marathahalli from my workplace in Jayanagar, and in the middle of my trip, the driver told me to get out of the car as there was more traffic on the road. When I refused, he pulled me out of the car and when I pushed him back, he punched me and banged his head on my face. My nose and mouth started bleeding immediately. When I tried to push the driver to save myself, he called other locals and started hitting me again,” he said.Stating that he had suffered injuries on his face and head, and experienced dizziness and vomiting, Chandra said a CT scan report showed injury to his brain channels and blood clots behind his eyes. “There are possibilities of permanent damage,” he said. Chandra was treated at Yashomati Hospital, and later at Apollo and Columbia Asia hospitals. He then lodged a complaint with Suddaguntepalya police, while also writing to Uber.Uber said in an email to Chandra that it has “barred the driver pending further investigation”. “...Due to the critical nature of the incident reported, we have escalated the matter to the team concerned,” Uber told him.