Disability rights activist Arman Ali has shared a distressing experience of being "treated horribly" by two drivers of an app cab service in Chennai, for which he missed a flight and a meeting and had to shell out Rs 14,000 to book a fresh air ticket.
Ali, Executive Director of National Centre for Promotion of Employment of Disabled People, alleged that the first driver cancelled the trip around 15 minutes after verbally confirming it, while the second one refused to put his wheelchair in the backseat, "pushed out of the cab" and cancelled the trip.
In a Facebook post on Thursday in which he tagged the Prime Minister's Office and Narendra Modi, the Assam-based wheelchair-bound man said Uber India apologised to him and offered to refund the cancellation fee of Rs 45 only.
"I was treated horribly and #discriminated against by @uber @uber_india in #chennai yesterday evening. I had booked the 1st Uber for the airport at 3 pm which I verbally confirmed with the driver. He kept me waiting for 10-15 minutes and then he cancelled the trip," he said in the post.
Ali booked another car of the same service provider, but after he got into the car and had his luggage put in, the driver was unable to put his wheelchair in the boot.
"I requested him to put it in the backseat to which he refused and said he doesn't want to do the trip. I was unceremoniously pushed out of the cab and he cancelled the trip. I lost a huge amount of time due to these two uber drivers misbehavior," he said.
"When I finally reached the airport, the counter was already closed and I had missed the flight. Thus, I had to buy a new ticket for 14000 INR and wait for two more hours. This also resulted in my missing an important meeting scheduled for the same evening," the post read.
People with disabilities (PWDs) face discrimination in India "everyday" even after the country ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) long back and enacted the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act in 2016, he asserted.
"Government talks about PWDs being Divyang (divine bodies) but we are being treated like third class citizens and like burdens on society," the NCPEDP official regretted.
Ali on Friday tweeted: "Uber continues to make a mockery of of my humiliation with a shoddy apology and 'offering' to refund cancellation fee of Rs 45 < $ 1 & citing 'policy' for no other compensation, @Uberindia thinks that they can get away scot free with their repeated discrimination against #PWD & #RPWDAct. @UberIndia should pay for it (fresh air ticket). I will also file an FIR".
Following a writ petition filed by Ali, the Gauhati High Court pronounced a path-breaking judgement in March this year on making services accessible to persons with disabilities in the state, by imposing penalties on a gym and the Assam government for discrimination against such a person.
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