Telangana: Cabbies face violence, extortion

HYDERABAD: On a late July night, an alert notification beeped on a cab driver’s phone, intimidating him about his new ride. As usual, the driver dropped the passenger at the destination, which was in the Old City. While returning, he noticed three men in one of the streets, who were signalling him to stop. After the driver pulled down the window, one of them grabbed his collar and demanded money and the mobile phone.

“They threatened to damage the car if I did not part with the money and other valuables. I had no choice and there was no help from any quarters,” recalled Manikanta, a Uber driver.  In another incident, which happened a few months back, a group of men booked a journey from Yapral to Ramoji Film City. On the way, they thrashed the driver, snatched three mobile phones and '5,000 and threw him out of the vehicle before speeding away with the SUV.  According to the Hayathnagar police, the gang members were aged around 20. “We arrested the gang. They were involved in other crimes also,” said J Narender Goud, inspector of Hayathnagar.

In a recent incident, a Uber driver was mugged by a gang near Madhapur at 3 am while he was returning after dropping a passenger. The city has reported many incidents where cab drivers were assaulted either by passengers or thugs. There were strikes by drivers, appealing to the police for protection. “We cannot help but accept a booking and attend to it once it is confirmed. We are always afraid when travelling through lonely roads late in the night,” said a cab driver. “They threaten to break the glass and damage the vehicle. We cannot afford that as our cabs are the only source of income for us,” said Manikanta.  The Madhapur police was successful in zeroing in on the gang who mugged the cabbie. “We were able to arrest them with the help of CCTVs, which helped us identify them,” said a police officer of Madhapur.

In the last week of June, a cab driver was attacked by a man who later fled with the cab in the wee hours in Suryapet. The police said the man had hired the cab at Rajahmundry and was heading towards Hyderabad. However, when they reached Suryapet, the passenger asked the driver to stop the car and gave repeated blows on his head with a huge stone and fled in the car.

Seeing the driver lying unconscious, locals took him to a hospital. In the beginning of this year, cab drivers had staged a strike, asking the authorities to take action. “Neither the driver nor the company gets details about the passenger who book a cab apart from the location, name and phone number, which are not enough for the police to trace culprits,” said Shaik Salauddin, president of the Telangana Four Wheeler Drivers Associations. “They should link Aadhaar card details with the App and register it. Besides, more details of the passengers, who book the cabs, also should be made available,” added Mr Salauddin.