A new entrant to the on-demand taxi aggregator business has on Tuesday moved the Karnataka High Court questioning the legality of recently introduced Karnataka On-demand Transportation Technology Aggregators Rules, 2016.
Vacation judge Justice A.S. Bopanna, before whom the petition filed by M/s Helion Technologies Pvt. Ltd. came up for hearing, has ordered issue of notice to the state government and adjourned further hearing to June first week.
The government, on April 2, 2016, had notified the Rules, under Section 93 of the Motor Vehicles (MV) Act, for ensuring safety of passengers who use taxi serves offered through On Demand Transportation Technology Platforms (ODTTP).
Pointing out that any rules, made under Section 93 of the MV Act, were solely to regulate entities that perform the activities of an agent/canvasser/solicitors, the petitioner claimed that “ODTTP service providers do not fall within the definitions of agent or canvasser nor do ODTTP service providers solicit customers for particular vehicles.”
It was also contended in the petition that condition for depositing securing deposit in the range of Rs.1 lakh to Rs.5 lakh in the Rules is contradictory to the MV Act, as per which only Rs.5,000 is required to be paid by agent/canvassers for contract carriage.
As the Rules prohibit the ODTTPs or drivers attaches to them from collecting hire charge exceeding the charge fixed by the Government, the petitioner has contended the State has no power to regulate the prices charged by the petitioners.
Referring to the condition that stipulates that an ODTTP must have at least 100 taxies attaches to for offering the services, the petitioner said that such condition is arbitrary as it denies the firms like the petitioners, who are new entrants to operating ODTTP service.
