Bengaluru man says car driver was abused, prevented from using Rapido bike

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A Bengaluru man recently shared a shocking experience he had with an auto driver in the city. He said the car driver forcibly stopped him from using the Rapido bike taxi, describing it as “thug behavior”. A user with the account “Karnataka Weather” on X mentioned that he had to cancel three bike rides after drivers abused Rapido drivers.

“Auto driver was behaving badly at Jalahalli metro station in Bengaluru tonight. As I was stepping out of the metro station, I booked a bike taxi through @rapidobikeapp. My first ride was on an e-bike and when the rider came for pick up I, the car driver started abusing him and chased him away. Realizing that e-bike taxis were banned in the city, I booked another ride through Rapido and this time I got a non-electric Honda bike. When he The driver who came to pick me up once again forced him to cancel the trip and not let me ride,” he wrote on the Weibo platform.

Thug behavior by auto driver at Jalalali Metro station in Bengaluru tonight

As I stepped out of the metro station I booked a bike taxi via @rapidobikeapp. The first time I rode an electric bike, when the rider came to pick me up, the car driver started…

— Karnataka Weather (@Bnglrweatherman) March 9, 2024

The user said he read a news report about a ban on e-bike taxis and then booked a ride. “This time I was going to take photos and videos of the car thugs with my phone. But when the riders came and we were about to leave, they came back, forced me to get out of the car and started abusing me. I told them ‘only e-bike taxis’ is prohibited, regular taxis are not. They said don’t tell us the rules, we know better than you. They didn’t allow me to take videos and pictures,” he added.

He urged Bengaluru police to look into the matter. “If all types of bike taxis are banned, then let the operators remove the bike booking option in their apps; if not, make sure we are not harmed by these car thugs,” the user concluded in the post road.

The Bengaluru police took notice of this and asked the user to share his contact details.

Meanwhile, several other netizens also shared similar instances.

“This situation is very common in Bangalore, recently, my friend and I also experienced this situation, first the car driver asked us to cancel the taxi and said he would take us at the same cost, so after we reached our destination, He charged double the taxi fare (600) and he abused us all,” one person commented.

Another netizen added: “This is a common scenario in all metro stations! Auto drivers are neither ready to charge meters nor allow people to book reservations! This is a very difficult situation but no action is taken!”

“Always walk 500 meters from any station and book a taxi,” one person advised.

Another person wrote: “This isn’t just in Jalahari. This is happening across the city.”