Court to hear case against Uber driver tomorrow; He’s the beast who raped woman

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New Delhi court  has  fixed 9 January for hearing arguments on framing of charges against a driver of US-based cab service provider, Uber, for reportedly raping a 27-year-old woman executive in December last year.

Additional Sessions Judge Kaveri Baweja, who is organizing a special fast track court exclusively set up to deal with cases of sexual offences against women, posted the case for January 9. On January 5, a metropolitan magistrate had taken awareness of the charge sheet filed by the Delhi Police in the case and committed the case to the sessions court for further beginning.

The woman who was allegedly raped by Uber taxi driver Shiv Kumar Yadav determined the man at the Tis Hazari court where she had gone to record her statement, and shouted “he is the beast who raped me”, Delhi Police said in its charge sheet.

Police said in the charge sheet that the woman, after recording her statement before a magistrate, was coming out of the court and saw the accused driver who was being taken by police for his custodial interrogation.

“The prosecutrix (woman)… Shiv Kumar Yadav ko dekhte huye pehchan liya aur shinakht karte hue chillai ki ‘yahi woh darinda hai jisne mera rape kiya hai’ (the woman identified Shiv Kumar Yadav after spotting him and shouted ‘he is the beast who raped me’),” the charge sheet said.

The incident took place at the Tis Hazari court 8 December, when the woman went to record her statement before Metropolitan Magistrate Riya Guha in court room No.247, while Yadav was coming out from court room No.264 presided by Metropolitan Magistrate Ambika Singh, who allowed Delhi Police to quiz the 32-year-old driver for three days.

Meanwhile, advocate Atul Srivastava informed the court on Wednesday that he has been appointed as Special Public Prosecutor in the case.

The police officials informed the court that one forensic report is awaiting.

32-year-old accused Shiv Kumar Yadav is now under judicial custody. Yadav, who was driving the cab, had allegedly raped the woman on the night of December 5 last year when the victim, who works for a finance company in Gurgaon, was headed back to her home in Delhi’s Inderlok area.

Yadav was arrested on 7 December, from Mathura in a joint operation by Delhi and Uttar Pradesh police and produced before the court on 8 December.

The police had filed the charge sheet against Yadav on December 24, 19 days after the incident, for alleged offences punishable under sections 376(2)(m)(while committing rape causes grievous bodily harm or endangers life of a woman), 366 (kidnapping or abducting woman with an intent to compel her for marriage), 506(criminal intimidation) and 323 (voluntarily causing hurt) under the IPC. (More) PTI SKV PAL In the charge sheet, the police had relied on the forensic evidence and also placed on record the route map of the car in which the offence was committed.

Yadav had refused to undergo Test Identification Parade (TIP), saying the woman had already seen his photograph in Uber’s website and she would definitely identify him. TIP is a process under the criminal law through which a victim of a crime identifies an accused.

The police had also told the court that Yadav was hired by Uber and it had not verified his particulars and they have lodged a case of cheating against the FIR