Kolkata Police arrested the driver of the Uber cab, Pintu Yadav and was produced before the court on Tuesday following which he was granted bail.
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Within a fortnight of a luxury taxi driver allegedly masturbating in the presence of a woman passenger, a driver of an Uber cab repeated the indecent act in Kolkata. “She filed a complaint with the Bhawanipur police station”, Deputy Commissioner of Kolkata Police (South Division) Murlidhar Sharma told DNA.
One 25-year-old woman, who works in a shopping mall, claimed that she boarded the taxi cab from Elgin Road area in Kolkata on July 8 at 7 pm. The woman added that when she protested against the driver taking an unnecessary detour, he threatened her with dire consequences.
The Hindustan Times quoted a senior police officer as saying: “We have arrested the driver and an investigation is on”.
“Upon being notified by the rider we immediately suspended the driver partner and assisted the local authorities with all necessary information required for their investigation”.
“In fact, the rider was satisfied with our immediate assistance and action and continues to frequently use Uber post this alleged incident”, it said.
In a similar incident earlier in the month, a woman in New Delhi had alleged that a TaxiForSure cab driver had masturbated while driving her around the city. However, she is yet to file any official complaint with police.
At a time when Kolkata was emerging as a hotspot for private ride-share companies, as stated in surveys, a driver was arrested for “outraging the modesty of a woman”.
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Though the CEO of TaxiForSure, Arvind Singhal, confirmed the Delhi driver was sacked and blacklisted immediately, online taxi services are constantly under fire in India for not carrying out more stringent background checks. But the U.S. company resumed its services in January 2015, despite Indian government officials confirming Uber was still on their blacklist. Later, the court granted him bail.
