New Delhi: The Delhi government has turned down once again the Ola Cabs application for the license to operate its cab service in the country’s capital. This is over a month subsequent to the Delhi high court requesting the transport department to reconsider the cab provider’s application. The SoftBank-backed organization boasts of a fleet of 25,000 taxis in India’s capital that are registered on its platform.
As per the government, the application in question was rejected as Ola did not file undertakings mentioning their compliance with an official ban put on the organization as well as some outlined rules. The organization had to submit mandatorily an affidavit detailing that it was following the official ban in spirit as well as action.
All app-based taxi services were prohibited in New Delhi after an incident of alleged rape by a Uber driver of a woman passenger in late 2014.
On June 3, 2015, the Transport Department had dismissed applications submitted by US-based cab booking company Uber and a couple of other similar service providers – TaxiForSure and Ola Cabs.
Subsequently following a High Court directive, the Transport Department had offered a final opportunity to Ola to express its views on the imposed ban.
A senior government official disclosed that the Government listened to Ola Cabs views at a hearing but didn’t find it satisfactory enough. The app-based cab booking company is committed to having all its taxis on CNG. However, that is only compliance to one rule by Ola when other existing rules remain unmet.
The official opined that to operate taxis in Delhi compliance to some rules is mandatory. The rules include set-up of digital fare meters, adhering to officially-approved fare structure, PSV badge as well as GPS.
As per government sources, M/s ANI Technologies Pvt. Ltd. on the banner of Ola Cabs was the filler of the concerned application. The Transport Department has intimated Ola that to apply again to obtain a license; it has to be routed via the freshly-introduced ‘City Taxi Scheme’ 2015.
Ola recently announced that it will provide benefits up to Rs 1 lakh as an incentive to its driver to change to CNG automobiles. This will aid the Bengaluru-based firm comply with a Supreme Court ruling as per that commercial vehicles are barred from plying in Delhi unless changed to the single fuel mode of CNG.
