Not so ancient history repeats itself!
Not so long ago people were taken back by an incident when a man from Madhya Pradesh refused to accept his online food order on the grounds that it was being delivered by a Muslim guy. Not only did it trigger a national debate but Zomato’s CEO Deepinder Goyal came out in support of his Zomato delivery executive and stated that his company wasn’t sorry to lose any business that comes in the way of its values.
In a similar incident recently reported, a man from Hyderabad also refused to accept the order on the same grounds that it was being delivered by a Muslim guy. The man had ordered his food through the online food delivery app Swiggy and the incident took place on Monday night.
Ajay Kumar, the customer apparently had ordered a chicken-65 from Grand Bawarchi restaurant at Falaknuma and had made an online payment for it. While ordering he also mentioned that his preferences were “Very less spicy. And, please select Hindu delivery person. All ratings will be based on this”.
Later when delivery executive Omar reached out to him for the delivery location, Ajay first enquired his name and then screamed and got angry at him before he finally rejected the delivery.
“He asked my name and when I revealed my identity, he was angry. He shouted at me for not honoring his preferences. He said he was rejecting the delivery because I was a Muslim,” Mudassir Omar.
Ajay later called up the customer care centre of Swiggy and picked up an argument with an executive. He argued that he preferred the delivery of the food item being made only by a Hindu delivery boy and would never accept it from a Muslim and that he wanted that the delivery be canceled and his money refunded.
When the customer care executive told him that he would incur the cancellation charges of Rs 95 and that the remaining amount would be credited to his account within five to seven working days, Ajay said he didn’t mind losing money, but would not accept the food delivered by a Muslim.
Mudassir, who claimed that he was a post-graduate student in science, said Swiggy would not go by the religion of the delivery boys while assigning the orders. “It was automatically assigned to me by the system which follows the GPS. Since I stay nearby, the order was assigned to me,” he said.
Omar has gone ahead and filed a police complaint against Kumar for hurting his religious sentiments.
