Apparently taking a cue from Uber, which is understood to have side-stepped an ongoing operational ban on its services by floating a frontal company to indirectly remain in business, another app-based vendor applied for registration under the recently-modified Radio Taxi rules on Saturday.
This time, it was Ola , which submitted an application to the Delhi Government Transport Department through a newly-registered company. “...we are applying for registration under modified Radio Taxi Scheme 2006 as an aggregator module. The registration filed is in the name of APRA Cabs India Pvt. Ltd under the brand name of OLA CABS,” the company stated in its application, which is currently under consideration and has been accessed by The Hindu .
A government source said that ‘many more app-based cab vendors were expected to follow suit in the coming days to attempt side-stepping the operational ban’ with such frontal companies .
The Central government imposed an operational ban on San Francisco-based Uber and other app-based taxi services in the country after the rape of a 25-year-old MNC executive aboard one of its cabs in December last year. Only six companies registered as radio taxi vendors had been spared with the department declaring all other service providers illegal.
After several measures since the ban was imposed on its services, Uber representatives first approached the Delhi High Court with an appeal against the ban. After that failed, they met Delhi Government officials with a request to lift the operational ban on its services as recently as early this week and then indicating that it was in the process of registering the new company, Resourcexpert India Private Limited, in Delhi as the last resort. Meanwhile, in a related development, the Delhi traffic police prosecuted 68 cabs and impounded 42 of these being run by separate companies for flouting rules on Saturday. A majority of these are found to be registered by Ola and one belongs to Uber. “We will continue such drives in the days to come,” said Muktesh Chander, Special Commissioner of Police (traffic).
‘Many more app-based cab vendors are expected to follow suit in the coming days’
