'Uber fires executive who obtained Indian rape victim's medical records'

Ride-hailing company Uber has fired a top executive who had allegedly obtained medical records of a 26-year-old woman raped by an Uber driver in India in 2014, according to a media report.

Eric Alexander, the president of business in the Asia Pacific, was fired on Tuesday, just as the company announced that it had fired 20 employees over the last few months for harassment, discrimination and inappropriate behaviour.

Alexander had obtained the medical records of the woman, who was raped and assaulted by Uber driver Shiv Kumar Yadav in New Delhi in December, 2014, a report in the technology news website Recode said. The report quoted sources as saying that Alexander had showed the medical records to "Uber CEO Travis Kalanick and Senior Vice President Emil Michael". Further, numerous executives at the car-hailing company were either told about the records or shown them by this group and sources said Alexander had carried around the document for "about a year" before other executives, "presumably the legal department, obtained the report and destroyed his copy".

The report said Alexander was not among the group of 20 people fired by Uber as part of an internal investigation into its workplace culture after employees made allegations of sexual harassment and a toxic work environment.

Alexander's handling of the situation was among the over 200 claims reported to two law firms which were conducting the investigations into widespread management issues at the company, the report said. The news website contacted the company about Alexander's actions, it was told that he was no longer employed there. It quoted an Uber spokesperson as saying that Alexander was no longer with the company. The 2014 incident had triggered scrutiny into Uber by the Indian government and the company was banned from operating in Delhi till June 2015.AGENCIES