Indian Uber driver accused of rape previously arrested for assault

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - An Uber taxi driver will appear in an Indian court on Monday accused of raping a young female passenger, as the popular U.S. online ride-hailing service came under fire for hiring a man who was arrested for a sexual assault three years ago.

Indian police said they were considering legal action against the online taxi service for failing to run background checks. The company said there were no defined rules in India on background checks for commercial transport licences and it was working with the government to address the issue.

"What happened over the weekend in New Delhi is horrific," Travis Kalanick, Uber?s chief executive officer, said in a statement. "We will do everything, I repeat, everything to help bring this perpetrator to justice."

The attack is the latest to draw attention to the dangers faced by women in the world?s second-most populous nation. Even after the enactment of new laws imposing stricter penalties and establishing fast-track courts, India is struggling to tame attitudes that leave women vulnerable to harassment and rape.

The arrested driver, Shiv Kumar Yadav, is expected to appear in court on Monday afternoon. He was arrested for raping a woman three years ago but was later acquitted, police said.

"Every violation by Uber will be evaluated and we will go for legal recourse," said Madhur Verma, deputy commissioner with the Delhi police.

Police said the 32-year-old driver dropped the woman home after attacking her and warned her not to inform the authorities. She managed to note the driver's number and take a photograph of his car, they said.

Police accuse Uber of failing to check whether the driver had a clean police record or had a satellite location device in his car.

The sexual assault happened two years after the fatal gang rape of another young woman taking public transport in New Delhi. That case led to nationwide protests and forced the government to address demands for heavier sentences for rape.

In a chilling reminder of the 2012 bus attack, the 26-year-old victim of Friday night's assault told police the driver threatened to insert a rod in her genitals, Indian media reported.

NIGHT TIME DANGER

India is the fourth most dangerous place for a woman to take public transport, according to a poll published in October by the Thomson Reuters Foundation. It was ranked second-worst on safety at night and for verbal harassment.On an average, 40 cases of crimes against women are registered daily by Delhi Police. This includes at least four cases of rape every day, the Minister of State for Home Affairs Haribhai Parthibhai Chaudhary told parliament last week.

Monica Kumar, a clinical psychologist, who heads the Delhi-based Manas Foundation, said many taxi drivers are often migrants from less-developed areas where patriarchal attitudes remain prevalent and were not accustomed to seeing women out alone late at night or dressed differently.

"No one talks to them, no one engages with them," said Kumar, which runs gender-sensitisation classes for rickshaw drivers. "The conversations about the changing scenario in cities like Delhi where women are becoming more empowered are just not happening."

The criticism of Uber comes at a time when the company has faced critical news coverage over its driver screening in the United States, and has apologised for comments by an executive who suggested "digging up dirt" on journalists investigating the firm.

That has not stopped the San Francisco-based firm from raising investment that values it at $40 billion, reflecting the perceived potential of its expansion into high-growth markets like India.

(Additional reporting by Nita Bhalla; Writing By Andrew MacAskill; Editing by John Chalmers and Jeremy Laurence)