We are living in the world of social media. One incident and it doesn’t take too long for it to go viral. Good thing or bad, almost everything breaks the internet today.
Understanding the power of social media, perhaps, Sachit Agarwal, a resident of New York narrated his harrowing experience at one of Hauz Khas’ most popular hangout place — Summer House Cafe.
This is what he posted:
“Furious and Ashamed to be a resident of Delhi, this city and its people can easily qualify for one of the most insensitive and rude city of the world. My wife and I with some friends went to Summer House café, Aurbindo Place, Hauz Khas Market on Saturday, Sep 12th for a normal evening of food and beverages. While we were coming down the stairs of the café a drunk guy misbehaved and touched my wife inappropriately, I immediately confronted the person and we had an argument (no physical fight). Suddenly 4-5 people came and started dragging me on the staircase and started punching/hitting me while I was resisting.
I initially thought it was some friends/relatives of the guy who misbehaved but to my utter shock it was the Manager and staff of Summer House Café. They got me down the stairs with both internal and external injuries and left me outside (some pictures attached). They treated me as if I was some criminal, while I was trying to save my wife and had just paid a $300 bill for their pathetic food and service. I’m a normal citizen who is educated and a senior management professional.
Insensitive Delhi – nobody confronted the Summer House staff or helped me. Nobody bothered to give me medical aid or even water while I was there gasping. On the other hand when I was trying to call the police, everyone to my utter surprise told me to not pursue this case as nothing will happen.
“Sab Chalta hain” in Delhi. Police came after 30-40 mins, by the time the guy who misbehaved had fled. After a lot of persistence I finally managed to get a complaint filed (copy attached, yet to receive copy of FIR) and was taken to government hospital for medication (after 3 hours of the incident). Police managed to get hold of the Manager and he was brought to police station for verification – instead of being apologetic the guy claimed innocence and that I was lying. Luckily the police got all the video camera recordings of the place and it clearly shows the high handedness and inhumanly behavior of Summer House staff.
Reason I’m putting this on social media:
1.Spread this incident so much that Summer House Café or similar places in Delhi don’t repeat this and are more sensitive to their guests. The way these places in Delhi function they don’t bother and have bagful of egos that nothing will happen to them
2.Summer House Café management should come out with an explanation of this this way of treating their guests #boycottSummerHouseCafe
3.Delhi residents be more sensitive and help people in need, rather than ‘Sab Chalta hain’ attitude.”
However, the cafe jumped to its defense, saying, ““You can clearly see from the footage that there was no confrontation whatsoever, as the video shows you resorted to physical violence (guy in the white shirt) and as you can see you did not stop after slapping the guy, despite your wife and the management trying to stop you, you continued to provoke the guy with more violence, which could have escalated to a big fight, putting your wife and other people around at risk as well.”