Food App Zomato Apologises After Delivery Man Assaulted Female Customer

A major outrage erupted on social media on 10 March when content creator Hitesha Chandranee posted a video of her bruised and bleeding nose, accusing a Zomato delivery man of hitting her. Zomato, which claims to have over 11 million users in India, is one of the country’s biggest online food ordering and delivery apps.

In the last 12 hours, food ordering platform Zomato has faced a severe backlash in India after a video of an assaulted customer, Hitesha Chandranee, went viral on social media. Responding to the outrage, Zomato issued an apology to Chandranee.

“We deeply regret this incident and apologise to Hitesha for this traumatic experience,” the food delivery app has said.

In a video Chandranee shared on her Instagram and Twitter handles, she narrated that a Zomato food delivery man behaved violently with her after she asked customer service why her order was being delivered late.

“I was talking to the customer care person and meanwhile the delivery man did this, he hit me, left me bleeding here and ran off,” a shocked and visibly scared Chandranee said in her video, which she posted on the eve of 10 March; the clip later went viral on social media.

So guys this just happened to me yesterday
Pls support me @zomato @zomatoin @viralbhayani77 @sagarmaheshwari @ATSBB @bbcnewsindia @narendramodi @cnnbrk @AltNews @NBCNews @itvnews @DgpKarnataka @TV9Telangana pic.twitter.com/TBso6N23k3

— Hitesha Chandranee (@HChandranee) March 10, 2021

​Since the platform provides name and contact number of their delivery partners to the customers for emergencies, the Bengaluru police easily traced the man and arrested him for attacking Chandranee.

The #Zomato delivery guy who assaulted @HChandranee in Bengaluru has been arrested. pic.twitter.com/YLgV3ceYfH

— Radhika Parashar (@_RadhikaReports) March 11, 2021

​Zomato meanwhile, has also offered to help Chandranee with medical assistance if required.

Hey Hitesha, thank you for speaking to us, we can assure you this is not the experience our delivery universe stands for. Our local representative shall be in touch with you shortly to help you with the police investigation(1/n)

— zomato care (@zomatocare) March 10, 2021

along with assistance on the medical care required. We can't emphasise how sorry we are, rest assured we'll take necessary actions to prevent such incidents from happening in the future. (2/n)

— zomato care (@zomatocare) March 10, 2021

​Several Indians who frequently use the platform to ease their food cravings throughout the day and night have expressed fear to their security after this incident surfaced.

It's horrific incident. We aren't safe. Deleted @zomato account after seeing this video. @zomatoin never send me massages and emails. https://t.co/Jup1oHIfpX

— Rofl Gogoi 🇮🇳🚜 (@RoflGogoi) March 10, 2021

I feel @zomato must not get away with just a sorry and a "medical expenses" crap. The penalty must be harsher .. suspend their operations for a week or so. Such companies delivering stuff needs to understand the criticality of background check @amazon @swiggy_in @PoliceBangalore https://t.co/08ra3Urarw

— Debraj Mallik (@d_mallik) March 11, 2021

This is terrifying!
#boycottzomato @zomato @zomatocare @zomatoin https://t.co/e2ZLRutmUA

— 𝗚𝗲𝗼𝗴𝗮 𝘆𝗲𝗿𝘁𝗶𝗲𝗻 👁️‍🗨️ (@GYertien) March 10, 2021