Online restaurant guide and food aggregator Zomato got praise on Twitter for responding strongly to a user who claimed to have cancelled an order because a “non-Hindu” driver delivered it.
Food doesn’t have a religion. It is a religion. https://t.co/H8P5FlAw6y
— Zomato India (@ZomatoIN) July 31, 2019
The user, Amit Shukla, whose location on Twitter is shown as Jabalpur, tweeted on Tuesday night that he had cancelled an order on Zomato. Shukla tweeted, “Just cancelled an order on @ZomatoIN they allocated a non hindu rider for my food they said they can't change rider and can't refund on cancellation I said you can't force me to take a delivery I don't want don't refund just cancel”.
We are proud of the idea of India - and the diversity of our esteemed customers and partners. We aren’t sorry to lose any business that comes in the way of our values. 🇮🇳 https://t.co/cgSIW2ow9B
— Deepinder Goyal (@deepigoyal) July 31, 2019
Zomato responded to the tweet from Shukla on Tuesday, stating “Food doesn’t have a religion. It is a religion.” The tweet from Zomato, which was posted at 10.30am, garnered 4,000 retweets and over 9,500 likes by 12pm. Zomato founder and CEO Deepinder Goyal also joined in. He tweeted, “We are proud of the idea of India—and the diversity of our esteemed customers and partners. We aren’t sorry to lose any business that comes in the way of our values.”
After his initial tweet on Monday, Shukla tweeted, “@ZomatoIN is forcing us to take deliveries from people we don't want else they won't refund and won't cooperate I am removing this app and will discuss the issue with my lawyers”. Shukla also attached screenshots of the purported order and the name of the driver, restaurant and a chat with Zomato support.
One of the screenshots is of a conversation with Zomato support, in which Shukla asks to change the driver as "we have shrawan and I don't need a delivery from a Muslim fellow". Shukla also uploaded a screenshot showing Zomato had charged a cancellation fee of Rs 237 as food preparation had begun.
Zomato, which claimed to have delivered 38 million orders in March this year, is not the first company to vocally resist perceived bigotry on social media. In April 2018, cab aggregator Ola declared it was a “secular platform” after a Twitter user claimed to have cancelled a ride as the driver was a Muslim.
