‘Kindness isn’t transactional’: Woman helps Ola driver after bike runs out of fuel, gets ₹7 extra charge

A LinkedIn post by Ayushi Gupta, a Jaipur-based social media specialist, has gone viral after she shared how a routine Ola Bike ride turned into a reflection on empathy and unseen struggles.

Gupta wrote that her driver stopped midway when his petrol ran out. She said she had two choices — end the ride and book another, or walk with him to the nearest petrol pump.

“I chose option 2,” she wrote. “We walked about 1 km together. My ETA changed from 6:33 PM to 7:00 PM, but I thought, ‘It must be so tough for him. At least I’ll get my evening walk in.’”

After refuelling, the driver dropped her home. The app showed ₹101 as the fare. As Gupta began walking toward her house, the driver called her back.
“Madam, ₹108 hota hai,” he told her.

“I was confused,” she recalled. “‘How? It was ₹101 earlier.’ He said, ‘I don’t know.’ I asked, ‘Is it because of the extra distance to the petrol pump?’ and he replied, ‘Yes. I think so.’”

Gupta paid the extra ₹7 but walked home feeling heavy-hearted. “I started crying in front of my mom. Not because of ₹7 — but because in that moment, it felt like my empathy was invisible,” she said.

Her brother laughed, wondering why she was upset over such a small amount. But it wasn’t about the money, Gupta explained — it was that her patience and kindness had gone unnoticed.

Her mother then offered a perspective that has resonated online. “Sometimes people are so caught up in their own struggles that they can’t see the kindness around them,” her mother said. “That doesn’t make your kindness worthless — it just means he was probably too worried about his own day to notice yours.”

Those words changed how Gupta viewed the incident. She wrote that empathy isn’t transactional — people in survival mode often can’t look beyond immediate needs, and kindness still matters even when unacknowledged.

The story struck a chord online, drawing hundreds of comments from people who related to both sides — the commuter’s and the driver’s.

One user wrote, “Ah, happens. But people like him have a lot of burden — even ₹7 feels like a lot. So it’s not that your kindness wasn’t seen, but his responsibilities were too big for him to notice.”

Another said, “If you didn’t pay him ₹7, it might have shown as –₹7 in the app, and maybe he wouldn’t earn any profit. For him, this job might be his bread and butter.”

Many praised Gupta’s mother’s wisdom and her ability to remain kind despite disappointment. “Your spontaneous kindness and empathy are what the world needs,” one commenter wrote. “In a world obsessed with competition and material success, small acts like yours can inspire others to do better.”

Gupta ended her post with quiet conviction that kindness still counts. “I still believe in choosing kindness,” she wrote. “Even when it goes unseen. Because the alternative — a world where we all just ‘end the ride and move on’ — is far more expensive.”