The Maharashtra government has banned the use of non-transport vehicles for aggregation and ride-pooling (car-pooling), citing the safety and security of passengers.
As per a government resolution issued on January 19, non-transport vehicles including two-wheelers, three-wheelers and four-wheelers are banned (for the ride pooling and aggregation) “in order to ensure road safety of the general public and passengers at large”.
Currently, a few aggregators provide app-based bike, auto and car taxi services in major cities of Maharashtra.
Some of them provide mobile application-based aggregator service using vehicles, especially two-wheelers, registered under the non-transport category.
Non-transport vehicles are ones with white number plates and are not allowed to be used for commercial purposes.
On January 13, the Bombay high court pulled up bike-taxi aggregator Rapido for operating without procuring a licence from the Maharashtra government and directed it to suspend the services immediately.
The company has moved the Supreme Court against the HC order.
The GR said the use of non-transport vehicles as transport vehicles (commercial vehicles) is on the rise enormously, which raises serious practical and security concerns of the passengers and may cause serious threat to the road safety of the general public and passengers.
