Bengaluru: Namma Yatri's vroom story amid GST questions

With a fiftyfold increase in daily completed trips since January, Bengaluru auto-rickshaw drivers’ own ride-hailing app Namma Yatri is riding an unprecedented wave of success.

The app was launched in November 2022 on the Union government’s Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) platform. It wooed drivers with zero commission and riders with fair pricing.

But there were plenty of naysayers. Not just riders, even most drivers stayed away from Namma Yatri. Few thought it had a chance against ride-hailing Goliaths like Ola and Uber.

Nine months later, the picture has changed dramatically. Namma Yatri now does around 70,000 auto trips every day, or about 17 per cent of the 4.28 lakh auto trips facilitated by ride-hailing apps in Bengaluru. Nearly half of all auto drivers are now on Namma Yatri.

The app has reported a 70x increase in daily trips since November and 50x since January.

Namma Yatri’s rising popularity is unsettling big players. And critics ask why the app hasn’t taken an aggregator’s licence from the Transport Department and why it doesn’t pay GST on ride fares.

Uber recently approached the GST Council to seek clarity on the application of GST on auto-rickshaw services offered by e-commerce operators (ECOs) in Bengaluru and sought a level playing field, a source in the company said.

According to industry sources, the Director General of the GST Council sought clarification from Namma Yatri and the company had furnished a response.

A well-placed source in the Bengaluru-headquartered Juspay Technologies Pvt Ltd, which runs Namma Yatri in collaboration with the Auto Rickshaw Drivers’ Union (ARDU), explained why the app was different from its peers.

“We are a B2B SaaS (software as a service) provider. Our customers are auto drivers, not riders. We have no role to play other than providing tech. We don’t charge the driver any commission. That’s why we are not liable to pay GST,” the source explained.

As for licensing requirements, Transport Department Secretary NV Prasad said no ride-hailng firm, including Uber and Ola, had been issued an aggregator’s licence. “The matter is in the High Court of Karnataka. We will take action only after the court gives its ruling,” he said. Satya Arikutharam, an urban mobility expert who worked on Namma Yatri in the initial months, said the app was successful because it was “community-driven”.

But how long can Namma Yatri sustain without charging drivers any commission?

The source from Juspay said the company had started charging some drivers a nominal daily subscription fee but refused to give details.

D Rudramurthy of the ARDU said the company would likely introduce the subscription fee on August 15. He added that drivers had asked the company to charge not more Rs 25-30 per day.

“The modalities of the subscription fee are still being worked out,” he said, adding that the company would likely link the payment to the number of trips a driver makes in a day.