Uber, Ola get license from West Bengal govt

In a bid to ensure safety and security of passengers availing app based taxi services, the state transport department has specified three months time for the on demand transportation technology aggregators (ODTTA) to fulfill all instructions to get licence. 

The transport department on Tuesday handed over offer letters to the aggregators that include Ola, Uber, Meru and Taxi for Sure. The offer letters have been given with expression that licence will be given if they come up with the required infrastructure and submit pending documents within the next three months. It may be mentioned that West Bengal government is the first in the country to provide such offer letters and to frame guidelines for the operation of ODTTA. The process is on in Chandigarh but they are yet to come up with the set of norms. As per the norms the aggregators have to install surveillance cameras in all cars and there should be panic buttons in the cars. Beside the GPS system, there also has to be a 24x7 control rooms of each of the aggregators. It may be mentioned that one of the aggregators are taking help of a US based technical expert to install surveillance cameras in the cars. Discussion with the police is also required to bring the system of panic button in place. As per the guidelines, the footages of the surveillance cameras in the cars will remain stored for three days.