Mumbai: Newest app cab company S3 accuses rival of sabotage

Ola employee Rajesh Singh

It's only been a fortnight since the launch of S3 Cabs, city's newest cab aggregator, and Ola is already in its black book(ing). The drivers claim they have caught at least one Ola employee trying to sabotage S3 Cabs services by making hundreds of fake bookings and cancellations. They also recorded a video confession from the culprit, alleging he had acted on Ola's orders.

S3 Cabs, or Sayhadri Smart Safe Cabs, is the brainchild of drivers who were unhappy about being short-changed by Ola and Uber and wanted to strike out on their own. Within a week of their May 12 launch, though, the drivers noticed that they were getting hundreds of cancelled bookings. Praful Shinde of the Maharashtra Tourist Permit Union, one of the architects of the S3 app, said, "We suspected something was amiss when our company started getting bookings that were immediately cancelled. We checked our database and found that these phoney reservations were made by the same phone numbers. After some digging, we found that one of these numbers belonged to the driver of a rival company."

Ola employee Rajesh Singh confessed to sabotaging the S3 app via cancellations

Two can play this game
The S3 drivers decided to try some counter-sabotage. They called the mobile number, saying they wanted to register with Ola as drivers. "The man, Rajesh Singh, called us to Andheri. Another person was to join us from Dindoshi. We caught Rajesh, and he turned out to be an Ola staffer with an Ola Cabs ID card. He confessed to us that he had been given a target to make such calls every day, and harass S3 drivers," said Shinde.

Video confession
mid-day has access to video recordings of Rajesh's confession, in which he is heard admitting that his boss gave him a daily target of 250 bookings and cancellations. He said there were at least two others who were given the same task. In another video clip, his interrogators go through his S3 booking history and show how he made hundreds of cancellations over just two days.

Sohel Kazani, director of S3, said, "Yesterday, we caught Ola shamelessly appointing agents to keep S3 Cabs busy with fake bookings. This is purely a cyber crime, as per Section 43 (e), (f), (g) of the Information Technology Act, 2000, which relates to disruption and denial of access. We will even complain to the Competition Commission of India for unfair trade practices."

"The message will be loud and clear that S3, as a company, will not take things sitting down and will resort to legal recourse if things get unfair. Ultimately, it is formed by the very drivers who made Ola what it is today and can put it back to where it started from," he added. "We have filed a non-cognisable offence at Dindoshi police station against Rajesh, and will be taking our legal team into confidence before filing a First Information Report in this matter," added Shinde. Senior police inspector Rajaram Vhanmane from Dindoshi police station said, "I will have to confirm the details of any such case before commenting."

The other side
An Ola spokesperson said, "It is premature to offer any detailed comments at this stage, as we are awaiting a copy of the police complaint." The Ola team also said they had not received any formal notification from the police yet. The accused, Rajesh, was unavailable for comment.

250
Alleged daily target per person for cancelled S3 cab bookings

800
Number of drivers in S3 Cabs fleet

10
No. of transport unions behind S3

Also Read: Mumbai To Get A New Cab Aggregator In S3 Cabs Next Week