Yet another allegation has been made against Ola electric scooters, once again pointing the fault to a possible software bug on the electric two-wheelers. A 65-year old man now suffers with severe injuries due to the alleged fault.
The issue has been raised against the faulty reverse mode on the Ola scooters through a recent social media post. Apparently, the e-scooters activate the reverse mode by themselves, making them go in reverse as the accelerator is used.
The complaint has been raised by Pallav Maheshwari in a LinkedIn post. Maheshwari writes how the alleged bug in the Ola scooters activated the reverse mode when his 65-year-old father was trying to park the scooter inside his house. As mentioned in the post, the scooter reversed at full speed instead of going forward, leaving the rider with severe injuries on the head and the left arm.
This is not the first time that Ola has been blamed for this issue. The bug was highlighted earlier through a similar post on Twitter, wherein the rider fell off the electric scooter as it reversed at full speed. The injuries were minor in that case but the rider was left with severe trauma of riding the electric scooter ever again.
Maheshwari highlights this in his LinkedIn post. He mentions how “multiple reports of the reverse mode triggering in full throttle has been made by multiple Ola customers.” Despite these, the company is yet to address the issue or initiate a recall if the units are faulty.
A video depicting the problem also surfaced on Twitter late in March. It shows an Ola electric scooter constantly accelerating in reverse at a high speed due to the bug. While the exact speed may not be clear, it is easy to see that the e-scooter running in reverse at that speed can be hazardous for the rider and those nearby.
Electric Vehicles Prone to Bugs
The issue is not unknown to the EV world. Even Tesla has faced allegations of possible software bugs in its cars. Multiple drivers involved in accidents have blamed software glitches. Since electric vehicles rely on software for a major part of their operations unlike IC engine ones, the problem can’t entirely be neglected and has to be investigated every time for more data on what goes wrong.
When Ola will do the same for its electric scooters, is yet unknown. What can be said for sure is that there shall be issues faced like these in prevalent and future EVs too, until software for these automobiles is more focused on.
