Uber Sues Taxi Unions For Rs 12 Cr Over Strikes; Bombay HC Says Unions Cannot Stop Uber From Plying On Roads

The issue of strikes by taxi drivers have been bothering Uber India for a while.

Recently, taxi unions in Delhi-NCR declared a strike against Uber/Ola, which caused much unrest among passengers, and forced both Uber and Ola to negotiate.

But, it seems Uber has had enough of these strikes.

Uber Strikes Against Taxi Unions

In one of the rarest cases, a multinational company like Uber has decided to strike against taxi union, quite literally. They have filed a lawsuit in Bombay High Court against few taxi unions, demanding Rs 12 crore as compensation.

In their lawsuit, Uber has alleged that accused few taxi unions of stopping drivers from working, and blamed them as genuine drivers were “verbally abused, physically assaulted and threatened”.

The lawsuit alleged: “The defendants are deliberately, unlawfully and wrongfully resorting to violence and intimidation under the garb of strikes and protests in Mumbai and thereby restraining drivers associated with the plaintiff’s mobile App from operating and pursuing livelihood,”

The four taxi unions against whom the lawsuit has filed are Sangharsh Tourist Chalak Malak Sangh, an association of taxi owners and drivers, Action Committee of Maharashtra against Ola and Uber, Mumbai Vikas Foundation, All Drivers Welfare Association and Maharashtra Tourist Permit Union.

As per the lawsuit, few powerful taxi unions are creating an artificial obstacle for genuine, hardworking drivers, and resorting to violence so that none of them can work. In a way, these taxi unions are blackmailing Uber and compelling them to increase the payout.

The lawsuit said: “The defendants have been hampering the legitimate business of plaintiffs (Uber) by interfering in their operations quite extensively across the city of Mumbai. They have been indulging in threats to the driver partners of Uber, in the event, they wilfully continue to drive using the Uber App”

Bombay HC To Taxi Unions: You cannot stop Uber

Meanwhile, while listening to arguments by Uber, Bombay High Court has passed an interim order, thereby restricting taxi unions from stopping Uber drivers.

Justice S J Kathawalla, who was heading the bench, said, “I am prima-facie of the opinion that, injunction orders, restraining defendants are required to be passed,”

The Court also directed the joint commissioner of police (traffic) to ensure that such taxi unions are not able to stop drivers from working in Mumbai.

Uber Vs Apple

At the same time, a story has emerged in the US, wherein the author has claimed that at one point in time, Apple was so angry with Uber that their CEO Tim Cook once threatened to kick out Uber’s app from Apple play store.

Allegedly, Uber was storing and running a secret piece of code inside iPhones, even if the user had deleted the app. This was clearly against Apple’s rules, and Tim Cook didn’t take it lightly.

It seems that Uber is well aware of the tactics which are used to win businesses, and anyone wishing to use the same tactics against Uber will have to pay the price.

Do you think that Uber is right in suing taxi unions? Do let us know by commenting right here!