TWO taxi drivers have spoken out after one of them was hit by a stone while driving on Wakefield Road in Bradford in the early hours of Saturday morning.
After dropping off a customer in Bierley, Bradford, taxi driver Sarfraz Khan was driving back into town on Wakefield Road at 2.35am on Saturday when he was hit by a rock thrown from near the Winston Churchill pub by someone who he believed was a youth.
The stone, which looked like a piece of concrete with sharp edges, was thrown from across the road and travelled through an open window on the passenger side of Mr Khan's vehicle.
He contacted the police who recorded the incident as an assault.
A spokesperson for West Yorkshire Police said: "We have recorded a crime of assault on Wakefield Road on Saturday, August 27. The crime has been filed pending any new lines of enquiries."
"I was lucky the stone hit me in the neck and not on my head or in my eye," said Mr Khan. "This job is not safe."
Even though he was "surprised" by the incident and fears for his safety, Mr Khan will not be changing his job anytime soon.
"This is my livelihood," he said. "I don't have any other choice not to do this job. I've just invested in a new car because of the Clean Air Zone."
Mr Khan's friend, Habib Nawaz, who is also a hackney carriage taxi driver and is a member of the Bradford Taxi Association, said the incident is "upsetting and worrying" for taxi drivers.
"We need to protect the safety of taxi drivers and we need the police to take action," said Mr Nawaz.
"This is very serious. He got hit in the neck. He's very lucky this didn't cause an accident."
Mr Nawaz said two years ago, another taxi was shot at by an air gun on Wakefield Road, shattering both back seat windows.
Mr Nawaz said similar incidents of people throwing stones happen every two to three weeks in nearby Holme Wood, which has caused some drivers to refuse to go to the area.
"I don't want to refuse to pick up a customer but we also have to pay to repair our car windows if they are smashed. This can take our taxi off the road for a couple of days.
"We just want the police to do something. Too many times, taxi drivers don't report an incident because they don't think the police will do anything."
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