On August 11, a group of Zomato delivery executives in Howrah, West Bengal protested against Zomato and alleged that the company was “forcing” Hindu riders to deliver beef and Muslim riders to deliver pork. Amid the protests, a Twitter thread is questioning whether beef and pork are actually available for delivery in Howrah.
Twitter user ‘@peeleraja’ said he set his location to Howrah on Zomato app and searched for restaurants delivering “beef” or “pork”. According to the user, while the closest restaurant serving pork was over 10 km away in Park Street, Kolkata, the closes place serving a beef dish was around 15 km away. The user says that both the restaurants are out of Zomato’s delivery range. According to Zomato’s ‘Code of Conduct’ policies, the deliveries can only be made up to 8-10 km away from the restaurant without the dish being affected.
Here’s the Twitter thread:
I have roots in Howrah but havent been there in ages. But I do have the Zomato app. Just set location to Howrah and search for “beef” or “pork” – you too can do it.
— reply guy (@peeleraja) August 11, 2019
Here are search results for “pork”
Closest place serving it on Zomato is in Park street. The closest point in Howrah across the second Howrah bridge is over 10km away. Zomato does not deliver that far pic.twitter.com/Ws0y57zrzB— reply guy (@peeleraja) August 11, 2019
Here are the results for “beef”
Again, closest place is Park street. Not in normal Zomato delivery distance pic.twitter.com/q8sT8wFHnC— reply guy (@peeleraja) August 11, 2019
You can be assured that this “protest” is engineered by a group trying to stir up communal harmony in Howrah.
I am sure beef places exist. Just not on Zomato’s delivery network
— reply guy (@peeleraja) August 11, 2019
Durga Pujo is coming up. Watch out for efforts to disturb harmony then. They will happen. Point them out
— reply guy (@peeleraja) August 12, 2019
Additionally, we also did a search on Zomato app for pork and beef dishes using the location ‘Howrah, West Bengal, India’. When it came to delivery, no restaurants were delivering either pork or beef dishes to the location.
However, in the ‘self-pickup’ option, the closest restaurant serving pork was 7.6 km away and no restaurants serving beef showed up on the search list.
What the controversy is all about
A group of Zomato delivery agents threatened to go on strike in Howrah on August 11, refusing to deliver food containing either beef or pork. The employees said that they were “uncomfortable” handling the dishes and that Zomato was “forcing” them to deliver beef and pork against their wishes.
Zomato issued a clarification in a statement:
“In a country as diverse as India, it is impossible to ensure that vegetarian and non-vegetarian preferences are factored into delivery logistics. Delivery partners are unequivocally made to understand the practical nature of the job as they choose to enter the workforce. All our partners understand this fully. There is a small group of partners in Howrah who have raised concerns and we are looking to resolve the issue as quickly as possible. All our other partners are active in Kolkata and delivering food as always.”
“Food doesn’t have a religion”
In another controversy last month, a customer cancelled his order on Zomato and asked the company to change the delivery executive because Zomato had allocated “a non-Hindu rider”. Following this, Zomato put out a tweet saying, “Food does not have a religion. It is religion”. The sentiments were also echoed by the company’s CEO Deepinder Goyal who said Zomato wasn’t “sorry to lose any business that comes in the way of our values”.
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