Uber Driver Held After Woman Accuses Him of Masturbating in Car

Uber driver Prem Kumar was accused of masturbating while driving a passenger to Hyderabad Airport on 19 October.

An Uber driver who was accused of masturbating while driving a woman passenger to the Hyderabad Airport on 19 October, has now been arrested. The accused is the owner of the car.

Accused Prem Kumar has been arrested, he is the owner and not the driver of the car. He was driving as regular driver & was not on duty.

Vishwa Prasad, DCP, Madhapur, Hyderabad

The woman alleged that the driver of the Uber began to masturbate in the car, while ferrying her to the Hyderabad airport on Thursday, 19 October.

In a post on Facebook, the complainant, Uma Sharma wrote: “As soon as we were on the relatively empty ORR in #Hyderabad, he slowed the car to about a 50 kmph and kept glancing back in the rearview mirror. After about 5mins when I realized what he was doing, I shouted and asked him to stop the car – unfazed, and continuing his act, he very nonchalantly asked me what was wrong”.

After much screaming, he reluctantly stopped the car, and continued standing on the road until I took a picture of him and threatened to go to the cops.

Uma Sharma, in her Facebook post

Uma said that though she shouted and got him to stop the car, she was scared that he could harm her, even as he looked blankly at her "without an ounce of guilt".

“I was scared – as a woman alone in a still-unfamiliar city. Scared of what else he may do since I’d threatened him. Scared that he may return while I waited on the road for another cab. Scared at how utterly powerless I felt when he blankly looked at me, without an ounce of guilt on his face,” she wrote.

And most of all, scared that this was probably not the first time he’d done this- yet he was still out there, just a matter of time until he did the same, or God forbid, did worse with some other woman.

Uma’s post comes at a time when women across the world are using the the ‘#MeToo’ hashtag to speak up about sexual abuse and harassment they face.

In the post, Uma also mentioned the hashtag saying, "Today, I shudder to think how many of these #metoo statuses were because of the same vile men who repeated their actions – only because we were too scared to speak up."

Criticising Uber's driver verification process, Uma further said that she will file a complaint with the police.

"So today, I choose to speak up and I won't stop until #UberIndia takes responsibility for their non-existent driver verification and complete disregard for their passengers safety. I’m also taking this up with the cops to initiate action against this worthless excuse of a man," she wrote.

In a statement to India Today, Uber India said that it had barred the driver's access to the Uber app following the complaint.

What’s been described has no place on our app. Our community guidelines clearly reject such inappropriate behaviour. The driver partner’s access to the Uber app has been barred.

Uber, in the statement following the incident.

(This story has been updated to reflect the arrest of the accused. This article was originally published on The News Minute)

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