Uber holds gender sensitisation workshops for driver partners in Kolkata

Kicked off nationally with sensitising more than 6900 driver partners in 2018, this partnership aimed to strengthen Uber’s commitment towards sensitizing and educating driver partners to create a safer platform for riders and drivers.

The sessions were conducted twice a day for six days a week, with each of them being attended by 20-30 driver partners on an average in Kolkata.

Pavan Vaish, Head of Operations, India and South Asia said, “At Uber, we believe in the transformative potential of technology to create these new alternatives, but at the same time, we recognize that we still have a lot to contribute, specifically in terms of how to confront structural and systemic social phenomena such as gender based violence.

Kolkata is a key market for us and to further reiterate our commitment towards providing safe mobility to all those who use the Uber app, we are scaling up our gender sensitization workshops delivered by Manas Foundation in the city. We have seen an overwhelming response from our driver partners who display their certificates with great pride inside their cars.”

Adding to this, Monica Kumar, Co-Founder, Manas Foundation said, “We are very excited to scale up this distinctive program with Uber to engage men in taking ownership of the safety of their women passengers. These sessions involve participatory activities that clearly explain the concept of gender and how the laws governing gender discrimination and abuse have changed over the last few years.

The workshop helps clarify what encompasses sexual harassment and it is this understanding of the issue that has been crucial to the change in the treatment of women – as commuters and members of their own families.”