App-based ride sharing services getting popular
Although around 125,000 motorbikes and cars are providing ride sharing services in the city at the moment, the sector is yet to get formal legal recognition. It has been almost a year since the government has spoken about a policy, but that has not been implemented yet, leaving the service providers to operate in their own ways.
Sources in the government and the ride sharing companies say the organisations want to get registered with Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA), but debate over three clauses of the Ride Sharing Services Policy 2017 and two objections of police have stalled the progress.
Uber first introduced app-based ride sharing services in Dhaka in the year 2016. BRTA initially declared it illegal, but amid public demand tabled a ride sharing policy soon. In March last year, the policy was formulated on pen and paper. It says the companies have to get registered with BRTA and get 'enlistment certificates'. So far 16 companies have applied for that, but there has been no progress to that end.
Since there is no registration, the users cannot call 999 for emergency help. If the vehicles were registered, law enforcement could access the information of the driver and the location. Since the information have not yet been tagged with the national identity card database, this cannot be done at this moment.
With a view to finding a solution, Pathao Limited, Sohoz Limited and Uber Bangladesh on 14 February wrote a letter to State Minister for ICT Division Zunaid Ahmed Palak. They urged for his intervention to address five issues. They are (a) a car may only be registered with one company (b) a car has to be more than a year old to join the ride sharing platforms (c) ride sharing services cannot charge higher fares than the taxi cabs (d) there has to be a ceiling determining how many vehicles a company can register (e) vehicles registered outside Dhaka cannot offer ride sharing services.
The state minister wrote a letter to the BRTA chairman on 24 April and then on last Monday they sat together with the companies.
Sources in the meeting said they could not reach an agreement over the second, third and fourth issues. But the companies agreed to stop using vehicles registered outside Dhaka while BRTA seemed to have moved away from the position that a car may only be registered with one company.
The state minister said they would sit again with police to solve the issues.
When asked, Sohoz Limited managing director Maliha Kadir told Prothom Alo, "Everyone wants this sector to thrive. No significant development had been seen in a year, but they are now working to address the issues."
The Disputes
A clause in the policy says a car may only be registered with one company. The service providers say this is contrary to the spirit of entrepreneurship. The riders say this clause will let the companies a monopoly over them as they won't have the chance to go to other service providers. Whereas if they can choose as per their wish, there will be a competition in the market.
The policy says a car has to be more than a year old to join the ride sharing platforms. But the companies argue that the customers want new vehicles.
They also want to determine the fare as per demand and think it should not have anything to do with the fare of the taxi cabs.
On 10 February, the Dhaka Metropolitan Police wrote a letter to the BRTA, saying that vehicles more than 10 years old should not be in the ride sharing platforms. They also said there has to be a ceiling determining how many vehicles a company can register and vehicles registered outside Dhaka cannot offer ride sharing services in the capital.
Police say old motorbikes and cars are coming to Dhaka from different parts of the country, which is causing traffic congestion while inexperienced drivers are causing road accidents.
BRTA officials, however, said the decision to put a tab on the number of CNG-run autorickshaws has resulted in a situation where the commuters demands are not being met. As a result, there has been anarchy in this sector.
There are 1,04,389 motorbikes on the streets besides 18,253 cars offering ride sharing services.
Mozammel Huq Chowdhury, secretary general of Bangladesh Jatri Kalyan Samity, said, "The ride sharing services have been popular with the commuters. But there have also been some complaints, which the government cannot address because there are no legal frameworks. It has led to anarchy in this sector. If it is not addressed immediately, this ride sharing sector will soon collapse."
* This piece appeared in the print edition of Prothom Alo and has been rewritten here by Quamrul Hassan.