Shameful incident: Bengaluru girl racially abused by auto rickshaw driver

Looks like women will need to be extra careful every time they take an auto. Recently Bengaluru girl Aishwarya Subramanian was told that her short dress was inappropriate by an auto rickshaw driver, while in Mumbai a girl was told to get out of a rickshaw because she was  'too fat' . And now in another incident that has come to light, a girl was racially abused by an auto driver, cursed for being from the north-east and asked to go back to her state.

Apparently, the girl and her friend were looking for an auto around 11 p.m near the Kanteerava junction.. The one they found one nearby had agreed to go but with double fare. The girls bargained to pay a llittle more over the usual fare, and the argument started when the auto driver denied to take them and started using abusive language in Kannada.

The girl has since put up a facebook post about the incident. Here is some of what she had to say:

Yes my female friend and I were assaulted by an autodriver because we "politely" refused to comply with his term to pay him "double" the fare. Is there any law or official declaration that we should pay whatever they asked? He called us "east indian" and "Chinki" and abused us with every possible expletives also gesturing at his feet to take the sandal and came ahead to hit us. We were in the midst of a very crowded restaurant and people looked at us, laughing and simply telling us to leave the issue as the auto drivers grouped against us and started to shout in Kannada. He threatened to call the police, while I was the one to call the police as we found no option to stop the assault. He kept shouting at us refusing to speak in Hindi (which he knew very well) and pompously foisting his jingoistic attitude to speak in Kannada, while my mother tongue is Assamese & Mizo and my friend speaks Odia. If educated and very independent women are subjected to this violent attacks imagine the situation of females who aren't vocal enough?!

Also read:  How to handle cyber sexism? Stand up to it! 

Fortunately the law did come to he rescue here. The auto driver has since been arrested after the incident was reported and an FIR was lodged. However, incidents like these are disturbing. After all, in metro cities like Bengaluru and Mumbai, if women need to start thinking twice about taking a rickshaw, doesn't reflect too well on the metro city does it?

Feature Image Credit: sayfty.com