New Delhi bans Uber after driver accused of rape
Print Edition
US online ride-hailing service Uber has been banned in New Delhi after a female passenger accused one of its drivers of rape, reigniting a debate about the safety of women in the Indian capital.
Uber, which had employed the driver even though he had been arrested on allegations of sexual assault three years ago, would be blacklisted from providing any future services in the New Delhi area, the city’s transport department said.
“Keeping in view the violation and the horrific crime committed by the driver, the transport department has banned all activities relating to providing any transport service by the www.Uber.com,” special commissioner Kuldeep Singh Gangar said.
The arrested driver, Shiv Kumar Yadav, appeared in court yesterday and was remanded in custody for three days. He was arrested on charges of raping a woman three years ago but was later acquitted, police said.
Indian police said they were considering legal action against the taxi service for failing to run background checks on the driver. The company said there were no defined rules in India on background checks for commercial transport licences and it was working with the government to address the issue.
“What happened over the weekend in New Delhi is horrific,” Travis Kalanick, Uber’s chief executive officer, said in a statement before the ban. “We will do everything, I repeat, everything to help bring this perpetrator to justice.”
Police said the 32-year-old driver dropped the woman home after attacking her. She managed to note the driver’s number and take a photograph of his car, they said.
The sexual assault happened two years after the fatal gang rape of another young woman taking public transport in New Delhi. The incident led to the enactment of new laws with stricter penalties and fast-track courts, but India is struggling to tame attitudes that leave women vulnerable to harassment and rape.
India is the fourth-most dangerous place for a woman to take public transport, according to a poll published in October by the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
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