HYDERABAD: Content creator Siddeshwari Sugandh from Hyderabad had a tense encounter with a man claiming to be a Rapido driver near Charminar on Saturday night after he allegedly approached her and offered a ride.According to a video shared by Siddeshwari on Instagram, she was waiting for her auto when the man approached her on a scooter and asked, “Where are you going? Should I drop you?”He then asked if she wanted a Rapido ride.Siddeshwari said she immediately became suspicious and asked him to show his driver ID. She also noticed that the scooter did not have a vehicle number displayed.“I noticed that there was no vehicle number displayed, so I asked him, ‘Why don’t you have a vehicle number?’” she wrote in her caption.
Man starts downloading Rapido app when asked for ID
Instead of showing his Rapido credentials, the man allegedly began downloading the Rapido app from the Play Store.“That’s when I realised something was clearly not right,” Siddeshwari said.She continued asking him to show his ID and verify his identity. At one point, the man told her that the vehicle was not starting.
Hyderabad creator shares account of Charminar encounter.
Siddeshwari immediately questioned why he was offering her a ride if the scooter was not working.When she took the phone from him, the screen showed a page asking for an OTP. She then asked him to state his full name, but his response did not satisfy her.The exchange soon became tense, with Siddeshwari asking the man to leave.“Get lost from here,” she can be heard saying in the video.
‘What honestly shocked me was the confidence’
Siddeshwari said what disturbed her most was the confidence with which the man had approached her at night and offered her a ride without any prior booking or verification.“What honestly shocked me was the confidence with which he approached a woman at 9pm and offered her a ride without any prior booking or verification,” she wrote.She also clarified that she was not blaming Rapido for what happened.Siddeshwari said she regularly uses the platform and prefers it at night because she feels safer with its safety checks and post-ride calls.“I’m sharing this because this person used the Rapido name to gain my trust, even though he wasn’t actually a Rapido driver,” she said.
Rapido responds
Rapido responds to Hyderabad woman’s viral video.
Rapido responded to Siddeshwari’s post and thanked her for bringing the incident to its attention.The company said passengers can verify the captain and ride details directly on the app. It also said the OTP shared at the start of a ride helps ensure that the passenger is travelling with the correct captain and vehicle.Rapido urged users to verify these details before getting into a vehicle, particularly when someone approaches them claiming to be a driver without a booking.
