Trial begins for taxi driver
On Dec. 7, 2014, 32-year-old New Delhi Uber taxi driver Shiv Kumar Yadav was arrested for the alleged rape of a 26-year-old female passenger. The allegations caused the New Delhi government to ban Uber taxis in India’s capital city on Dec. 8, 2014, calling into question the effectiveness of the American company’s background checks.
In response, Uber CEO Travis Kalanick issued a statement, on Dec. 8, affirming the company’s stringent safety standards, while also establishing the San Francisco-based taxi company as a leader in transportation safety.
“We will work with the [New Delhi government] to establish clear background checks currently absent in their commercial transportation licensing programs,” said Kalanick in a Dec. 8, 2014 statement. “We will also partner closely with the groups who are leading the way on women’s safety here in New Delhi and around [India] and invest in technology advances to help make New Delhi a safer city for women.”
The criminal trial for Yadav began on Jan. 15, 2015, where the taxi driver was charged with criminal intimidation and kidnapping. Yadav pled not guilty.
Under Indian court laws, journalists are not allowed inside the court, while it is forbidden to publish or report on the victim’s statement. However, prosecutor Atul Shrivastava spoke with the Agence France-Presse (AFP) news agency, and said that the victim was certain in her ability to identify her attacker.
“She gave her statement confidently,” said Shrivastava to the AFP. “She saw the man and immediately said: ‘He is the person.’”
“She appeared angry, obviously. If someone curses you, you would be angry. Imagine her situation – that anger is more than justified.”
The BBC reported that, due to India’s notoriously slow legal system, Yadav faces trial before a fast-track court specifically established to deal with crimes against women. The fast-track courts were established in December 2012, after global outrage over the gang-rape and murder of a 23-year-old physiotherapy student.
The alleged events involving Yadav bring into question major complaints with the Uber taxi service both in North America and in the rest of the world, while also continuing to highlight concerns over sexual assault in India.
Earlier this month, news outlets reported that two Indian brothers and three other men were arrested over the kidnap and rape of a Japanese student near a Buddhist pilgrimage site.
In 2012, statistics from India’s National Crime Records Bureau released figures citing 585 recorded cases of rape in New Delhi, 232 cases in Mumbai, 68 cases in Calcutta, 94 in Chennai, and 90 cases in Bangalore. The total number of unreported cases is always expected to be higher, however.
Uber also faces criticism from groups claiming that the company’s policies on background checks are too lenient. The taxi company has been working on amending its policies since last year. Uber is currently banned in Thailand and Spain, while it has been banned in certain German and American cities.
The Yadav-Uber-rape case will continue forward, and prosecutors have said that they intend to produce more than 40 prosecution witnesses. Yadav also faced rape charges in 2011, but his accuser – also a taxi passenger – agreed to a settlement.