Amit Shah the Union Home Minister of India launched the new co-operative cab service platform backed by the government ‘Bharat Taxi‘. The app is based on a co-operative platform that offers a more driver-focussed model to aggressively compete with other cab services in the markets.
Unlike Ola, Uber and Rapido which are private, venture-backed cab aggregators. Bharat Taxi is based on a co-operative mode like Amul where the cab drivers are called ‘Sarathi’s’ which are also members and co-owners of the co-operative.
What is Special about Bharat Taxi?
Bharat Taxi is a driver-owned co-operative that does not have any per-ride commission. Although the drivers pay a fixed daily access fee of Rs. 30 to use this app. This is intended to let drivers keep a far away far larger share of the fare. On the contrary Uber and Ola drivers are heavily charged commission on each ride and this reduced the revenue of the drivers.
Is this App a Government app?
Bharat Taxi has been launched with support from cooperative institutions and the Ministry of Cooperation, which gives it a different backing compared to private startups. However, for users, this doesn’t change how the app works day to day.
This isn’t a government app altogether instead it is operated by Sahakar Taxi Cooperative Ltd (STCL), a multi-state cooperative society, in collaboration with National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC), and supported by various entities, including Amul and NABARD. Representatives of these bodies form part of the interim board.
Financial Express compared fares for a trip from Noida Sector 10 to IGI Terminal 3 across Bharat Taxi, Uber, Ola, Rapido. Here’s what emerged.
