Dear Ola (and Uber): users want efficiency, not nationalist hyperbole

Original image credit: Wikimedia.

In India, the Uber and Ola fight has taken an unexpected – and lowly – turn. The battle, fed by media frenzy, has spiraled into a ridiculous debate over which company is more “foreign,” and hence, potentially more (or, less, as the case might be), mindful of the laws of the land.

The answer, of course, is that both companies need to equally adhere to local laws to run a business, but Ola and Uber are missing out a major point in this irrelevant debate. It is that the urban Indian – the target audience that keeps these companies going – could not care less about their nationalities.

Ola now looks like it wants to change the conversation, and rightly so, but the damage may have already been done.

“It is a shame that our competition has to fan a debate of nationalism to hide their identity of being a multi-national, with serial violations of law as a business strategy, not just in India, but globally. This debate in our view is not about foreign vs. local but who is respectful of the local laws and who is disrespectful,” Pranay Jivrajka, Ola’s chief operating officer wrote in an impassioned blog post.

The urban Indian does not give two hoots about which company has Indian roots.

Trouble is, it could easily appear that the maelstrom over Indianism was in fact “fanned” by Ola’s attack on Uber in court, instead of the other way around. This makes it look like Ola, caught wrong-footed, is now desperate to be in the right.

Ola insinuated that Uber was flouting norms being a “foreign company”, and all hell broke loose. As can be expected, Uber wasn’t to take it lying down, and hit back with equal gusto.

Ola does, however, now insist that the charges were never about Uber’s origins, but about laws and adhering to them.

Foreign companies

In an affidavit to a court, Ola had said an Uber petition was “motivated and has been filed in an attempt to bypass the laws of the land by foreign companies who run their operations in this country for profit without due regard for the applicable laws.”

Ola also said it was the only cab aggregator to have been issued a license under the new regulations because it has satisfied all conditions.

Uber did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment.

Ola, India’s biggest app-based cab service, is in a cut-throat competition in the country with Uber, which has been investing many millions of dollars and more to expand its market share.

See: You’re as ‘foreign’ as us, Uber tells Ola after xenophobic attack in court

Who cares?