New Delhi bans cab service Uber amid rape probe, Transportation officials in India’s capital banned the online car service Uber on Monday after one of its drivers allegedly raped a female passenger.
The move was a blow for Uber in the huge Indian market as well as another public relations dilemma for the San Francisco-based company, which operates in 45 countries.
Uber has come under fire for what some critics see as a lax attitude towards protecting the private data of its consumers as well as the safety of its passengers.
In New Delhi, crowds gathered to demand greater protections for women as police called in Uber officials for questioning about their screening methods, saying that the company had not conducted simple security procedures such as fingerprinting or a background check on the driver.
The accused cab driver, Shiv Kumar Yadav, 37, was arrested on Saturday for allegedly assaulting a woman on the way home from a party the previous night.
In a statement, the region’s transportation department condemned the “unfortunate and heinous crime,” banning Uber from operating in the city . The service was still available in five other Indian cities.
In India, the alleged rape came as a chilling reminder of the city’s continued inability to provide safe commuting options for women at night — even after a fatal gang rape of a young woman aboard a moving bus two years ago.
Uber said in a statement on Sunday that safety was its top “priority.”
“What happened over the weekend in New Delhi is horrific,” the statement said. “Our entire team’s hearts go out to the victim of this despicable crime.”
The company’s CEO, Travis Kalanick, stopped short of acknowledging systematic company failings. A statement by Kalanick blamed the India’s licensing norms, and said Uber will “work with the government to establish clear background checks currently absent in their commercial transportation licensing programs.”
But Indian police said that investigation revealed shortcomings in the company’s Indian operations, which were so bare-bones that police were unable to find the phone number or address of Uber’s India office from its Web pages when the rape complaint was made.
An Indian Express article said the police officer had to finally download the Uber application and book a cab in order to locate the Gurgaon address of the cab company.
Uber was formed in 2009 in San Francisco and has been under scrutiny almost since its inception. Traditional cab companies called it an illegal taxi service.
Last month, meanwhile, an Uber executive suggested he would pay to dig up information on the personal lives of journalists writing negative things about Uber, comments that appeared to target a Silicon Valley writer who had been chronicling the sexual misconduct of Uber drivers in the United States.
The woman allegedly assaulted, a 27-year-old employee at a tax consulting firm in a New Delhi suburb, booked the Uber cab through her cell phone app late Friday to return home, police said. Yadav punched and slapped her and sexually assaulted her, the victim told police.
When he dropped her home, he threatened to come back and kill her if she reported to the police, authorities said. But the young woman was able to snap a picture of the cab with her cell phone after leaving the car.
The suspect was acquitted of rape charges from an incident in 2011, police said.
Friday’s alleged attack shocked many Indians who have come to rely on hailing cabs booked though companies that use GPS or through smartphone applications, which are widely regarded to be safer than public transportation because of the ability to track the commuter’s cab location in real time.
“Sleek App, sleeker cars till one ride opens a cab of worms,” said a headline in the Indian Express newspaper on Monday.
Kunal Lalani, president of Association of Radio Taxis in India, said that the incident was likely to have an impact on the new, but burgeoning, business of private cabs in India. Uber has been operating in India since 2013.
"Certainly there will be an immediate impact on the business and create trust deficit,” said Lalani.
Protesters angry about yet another high-profile incident of violence against women shouted outside the police station in New Delhi.
“We need to invest in safe public transport and services for women. In its absence, we are relying on several private cab companies without knowing who is monitoring or regulating them,” said Suneeta Dhar, head of Jagori, a non-profit that has works with women.
For many women in the city, the incident is a wake-up call even though they already take additional precautions when they take a private cab.
“I take the vehicle number and driver's number beforehand and pass it on to my family,” said Sonam Vardhan, 26, who works with an e-commerce company and commutes on private cabs every day.
