The multinational ride-sharing company, Ola will be restarting its bike taxi services and is going all-electric for 25 rupees for 5 km and 50 rupees for 10km in Bengaluru state. The CEO and co-founder, Bhavish Aggarwal took to site X, formerly Twitter to announce this news and stated “Restarting Ola Bike in Blr today. This time, all-electric and our own S1 scooters.”
source: Inc42
This news comes at a tumultuous time when the Karnataka state government has announced that it is planning to ban bike taxi services. Ola and several other taxi services like Uber and Rapido have been operating non-electric bike taxi services, but this is the first time for the cab service to launch electric bike taxis. Aggarwal said that the bike taxi services will be run all across India in over a few months.
 "Ola Launches Electric Bike Taxi Services In Bengaluru 88")
SOURCE: scooter factory
The bike taxi service has faced quite a lot of resistance in the country. In February this year, the Delhi Transport Department issued a notification banning the bike taxi services provided by popular aggregators like Ola, Uber, and Rapido. It also said that a fine of Rs 1 Lakh would be slapped on the aggregators flouting the norms. In June, the Supreme Court issued a stay order to the Delhi High Court allowing bike aggregators to continue their operations until the regulations were notified.
sources: PardaPhash
Although Karnataka has been the first state in the country to introduce an electric bike taxi policy no operator has been able to start the bike taxi services in the state. The Federation of Karnataka State Private Transport Association, representing 36 bus, taxi, and goods vehicle unions in Bengaluru has been urging the Karnataka government to impose a ban on bike taxis in Bengaluru, claiming that the bike taxis have become unsafe for women and it is affecting their livelihood. Auto drivers are reported to have been attacking the Rapido bike taxi drivers for doing their jobs.
source: BusinessToday
After the the Federation of Karnataka State Private Transport Association announced Bengaluru bandh last week, Karnataka Transport Minister Ramalinga Reddy stated that the government in working on solving the issues of auto and taxi drivers in the state.
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