Uber defies transport dept warning, continues to run in Delhi

Company is partially compliant with some new CNG cars; the rest of the fleet remains the same

We show respect to women,” added the soft-spoken S Rama Mohan as an afterthought as this reporter got off an Uber car on Saturday afternoon.

In the last one month, Uber has provided training on how to interact with women customers to Mohan, who was overtly courteous throughout the ride, and to thousands of its other drivers. Uber was banned in early December after an alleged rape of a finance executive by a driver on its network.

The company returned to the roads on Friday after it applied for a licence under the amended radio taxi laws.

Both drivers and customers have hailed the return of the company, which has put in significant effort to beef up its security checks after the rape incident. However, the fact that Uber decided to restart operations without waiting for the licence to be awarded (which could be weeks away) and the ban to be lifted has irked the transport authorities.

Orders have been issued to impound vehicles plying through the Uber network in Delhi till it receives a formal approval to operate. But Mohan is not aware of this fact. He chooses to stop his vehicle next to a Delhi police patrolling jeep without alarm.

Perhaps he knows there is not much to worry about. Even though the transport department has instructed its officials to confiscate vehicles, “the police department is not doing much to enforce the ban,” said an official. The smaller transport department with around 200 people would do what it could to address the breach, the official added.

Uber declined to react to the comments by the transport department. The department, on its part, said there was nothing new to communicate. “The ban orders have not been revoked yet,” the official added.

Meanwhile, Uber’s domestic counterpart OlaCabs also applied for a radio taxi licence on Saturday. Like Uber, which chose to apply through a subsidiary called Resource Expert India, OlaCabs applied via Apra Cabs India Pvt Ltd.

The strategy seems to have been prompted by the fact that under the new regulations, the taxi operator will be jointly as well as individually liable for criminal activity involving any vehicle on its network. “The subsidiary will ensure limited liability,” said the official.

As far as meeting the new norms are concerned, Uber is partially compliant. New cars on its fleet run on compressed natural gas and have Uber’s name on both sides of the car, but the rest of the fleet continues to run on diesel or petrol. When questioned, the company chose to be silent on this aspect as well.

Uber is looking at a fourth option of booking radio taxis. It offers three services in India, the premium Uber Black, the mid-market UberX and the low-end UberGo. The fourth option could bring on board regular taxis in Delhi through the Uber app. In Singapore and New York, Uber operates through this model. It charges $2 for hailing a taxi in New York while it takes a 20 per cent commission on other vehicles.

The company continues to argue that it is better regulated under the information technology law because it is a platform that connects drivers with passengers. However, it is unclear if offering the radio taxi option makes its case stronger.

“We have been asked to put these stickers (Uber) on both the sides and the panic button has been installed. I have tested it, and it works. If you press the button, I’ll get a call and you will either get a call or a message almost instantly. Good that Uber started the service again. We had suffered in the past few weeks, and so (did) our income. Why should everyone pay the price for just one person’s wrongdoing?” said Umesh Singh, an independent car owner on the Uber network.

Mohan, on the other hand, claims he is on the networks of most other taxi aggregators but has chosen to work with only Uber. “They call us partners, never driver… even in the messages they send us, it is written partner, not driver… I will only work with them,” he adds.

With inputs from Sounak Mitra