They may be easier on the average commuter’s pocket, the environment and the Capital's congested streets, but shared rides aboard cabs are on the verge of being outlawed in Delhi, sources claim.
According to a Delhi government source, the City Taxi Scheme 2017, a regulatory framework for the operation of cab services in the Capital, which is in the process of being finalised, will not allow shared rides due to the “absence of enabling legal provisions for such journeys in the Motor Vehicle Act, 1988, in its current form.”
Carriage permits
At the core of the issue, said officials, is the difference between the conditions of contract carriage and stage carriage permits.
A contract carriage permit allows for ferrying a passenger or passengers for hire from one point to another without stopping to pick up, or set down, more passengers.
A stage carriage permit allows the ferrying of passengers picked up, and set down, in stages at separate fares.
Cabs are operated as per the provisions of contract carriage permits unlike, say, buses which pick up and drop passengers along permitted routes as per stage carriage permit rules.
‘Amendment required’
“There is no legal framework to allow shared rides on cabs operating under contract carriage permits at the moment; a suitable amendment to the Motor Vehicle Act allowing such rides is the sole prerogative of the government,” said the official.
Bengaluru had recently banned shared journeys aboard vehicles being operated by certain prominent cab aggregation service providers in light of similar legal constraints.
A source claimed the City Taxi Scheme 2017 was in the process of being reviewed at the higher levels of the city’s administrative circles and expected to be notified soon.
In addition to legal curbs on shared rides aboard cabs, the scheme, which was being drafted to allow the registration of cab aggregation service providers, would institute caps on fares.
It would also limit the total number of vehicles that can be operated by them, said officials.
Step forward
It will, however, be the first opportunity allowing the registration of certain prominent cab aggregation services in the Capital two years after a Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) directive to shut them down following the rape of a private executive aboard a cab in November, 2014.
The Delhi Transport Department had also requested the Department of Electronic and Information Technology (DEITY) to block the web-based apps of three major taxi operators citing complaints that these were still operating in the Capital despite being unregistered.
