India's central bank chief lashed out at Uber, already under fire over the alleged rape of a passenger, saying the US taxi-hailing firm violated the country's financial regulations by using an overseas payment system. A row over the highly valued start-up's financial transactions erupted in India earlier this year after domestic taxi firms complained Uber was not following the country's two-step authentication system for e-commerce credit card payments.
"They (Uber) were using a way of bypassing our regulations to conduct transactions overseas which were in violation" of Indian regulations, the central bank governor Raghuram Rajan told NDTV. India will not tolerate such violations "no matter who you are", he warned. "If we are a country that is going to turn a blind eye to a violation of regulation... then we don't have rule of law," Rajan said.
Rajan's comments come after Uber ran into fresh controversy in India earlier this month when it was banned from operating in the nation's capital over the alleged rape of a woman passenger by one of its drivers. The driver was formally charged with rape of the passenger and the case raised new questions about Uber's driver-screening procedures. Uber, which has been engaged in judicial fights with governments around the world over safety and licensing issues, has said it is committed to protecting its passengers in India and globally. Uber later migrated to a new transaction process in India in conformity with banking regulations. The third-largest Asian economy is one of the company's key markets outside the United States and operates in nearly a dozen Indian cities.
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