Blame on Centre for Uber mess

Apps still not blocked, city govt writes to MHA

 Unable to enforce a total ban on illegal app-based taxi services, the Delhi government has now written to the central government blaming it for not doing enough to block the Mumbai-based servers of Uber and Ola cabs.

Delhi Transport Minister Gopal Rai has written a letter to the Union Home Ministry claiming that the surreptitious operations of these two illegal operators could have been checked by now had the Communications and Information Technology Ministry blocked their servers, sources said.

Expressing limitations in checking the illegal cabs’ operations, Rai said the Delhi government has already warned the two cab operators that their fresh applications seeking cab licences would be rejected if they do not stop their “illegal” service.

The letter written by the Arvind Kejriwal government to the central government, in a way, exposes the systemic limitations in checking operations of unscrupulous app-based taxi operators.

The Delhi government told the Delhi High Court on February 25 that “Operations of ANI Technologies Pvt Ltd Ola cabs and operations of Uber India system Pvt Ltd have been banned by the competent authority to ply in Delhi,” a claim that flies in the face of the continuing services of these illegal operators.

According to sources, Rai wrote in his letter that the two taxi operators have been reminded about the conditions required for running app-based cabs.

The two operators have been issued notices asking them whether they have conducted verification of drivers, installed GPS units in vehicles and brought on-road fit vehicles.
Earlier, a special drive was carried out by the field functionaries of Delhi Traffic Police and 35,597 taxis were found plying on city roads against the instruction received from the Home Ministry and the Delhi Transport Department.

The Transport Department has modified the Radio Taxi Scheme, 2006, and laid down terms and conditions for licensing of taxi services, which came into force from December 2014.

The illegal operations of the app-based cabs came to light when an Uber cab driver sexually assaulted a passenger in his vehicle in December 2014.

According to police, the 25-year-old woman executive was allegedly raped by 32-year-old Shiv Kumar Yadav on the night of December 5, 2014, in the cab she hired to head back home in north Delhi’s Inderlok.

The accused took the woman to an isolated place with the motive to commit the heinous crime.