Madras HC allows Rapido to operate in Tamil Nadu after 2 weeks ban

After banning Rapido in Tamil Nadu for nearly two weeks, Madras High Court has finally given relief to bike taxi service provider by allowing it to operate in the state.

A Division Bench of the Madras High Court had restrained the Hyderabad-based startup until the State government frames regulations like Telangana, Rajasthan, and Chandigarh for services such as carpooling, bike taxi and call taxi.

The interim order was passed after Rapido explained to the judges the procedure of booking bikes through the app and how it follows all necessary measures including riders safety to operate bike taxi.

Notably, Rapido claims to operate without earning any profits at present. It only connects riders to bike owner through the app and collects fuel expenses from them.

The Division Bench also granted two weeks time for filing the counter affidavit and disclose the likely date to frame specific regulations for bike-sharing app operators.

Of late, a group of bike taxi operators had protested against the government's order and demanded to restore the service in Tamil Nadu. As per estimates, there are 25K bike taxi riders in the state.

In an earlier interaction with Entrackr, Aravind Sanka, Co-Founder, and CEO Rapido said that the government understood the need for this and Regulatory framework is going to come in 4 months and the firm will be working closely with the government to help them form it.

Beside court order, commissioner of Police, Cyber Crime Cell had also asked Google and Apple to ban the application in the state. Reacting on the matter, Apple had removed the app and iPhone users across India still unable to find the app on the App Store across the country.

The development was reported by The Hindu.