What’s the news: Two men assaulted an Uber woman driver on the intervening night of January 9, 2023, and January 10, 2023, who was waiting for a ride at Kashmere Gate, Delhi. The news comes nearly three weeks after Delhi’s women gig workers gathered at Jantar Mantar to demand their dues. Four-year veteran driver Priyanka Devi Dariwar was driving towards Kashmere Gate at around 2:30 AM to start her sixth ride for the night when a brick smashed her car’s windshield. Suffering a wound to her head, she stopped the car and saw two men approach her. One of the attackers was armed with a broken glass bottle. “I said take the phone, take the money as well but the car is owned by someone else. I can’t give the car keys. In the scuffle, he hit my neck with the broken bottle,” Dariwar told MediaNama. Why it matters: Last month, Fairwork India released a report that gave Uber a zero rating in terms of maintaining labour standards on its platform. This included security measures as well. Moreover, just weeks ago, Delhi’s women drivers demanded eight destination choices for rides as a “go home” option and asked the aggregator companies to bear the cost of setting up an SOS button. The urgency of these demands becomes more apparent every time such an incident occurs where a driver’s life is endangered. No use of the SOS button: According to Dariwar, her screams caught the attention of nearby truck drivers which forced the…
