The Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 draws a sharp line between private (white-board) and transport (yellow-board) vehicles. A private car used “for hire or reward” without a permit invites penalties and possible suspension of registration. The 2019 amendment created a statutory category of “aggregator” and introduced a licensing regime, but it was drafted for ride-hailing, not ride-sharing.

The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways issued Motor Vehicle Aggregator Guidelines in 2020, followed by a substantially revised version in 2025 covering Ola, Uber, Rapido and similar platforms, with detailed rules on surge pricing, driver compensation, insurance and grievance redressal. Neither framework, however, creates a dedicated regime for genuine cost-shared carpooling between commuters. The result is policymaking by improvisation.

In late 2023, Karnataka’s transport department, after sustained lobbying by taxi unions, declared the use of white-board cars on carpooling apps such as BlaBlaCar and Quick Ride illegal, attracting fines under state motor vehicle rules.

Bengaluru — India’s most congested city, where BJP MP Tejasvi Surya has noted that vehicle numbers have risen sixty-fold since 1990 — was effectively asked to prioritise taxi-operator revenues over peak-hour decongestion. Maharashtra’s Aggregator Cabs Policy 2025 takes the opposite approach, expressly recognising carpooling, capping drivers at 14 pool trips per user per week, and requiring fares not to exceed RTA base rates.

Some states tolerate the apps; others penalise the same activity. Transport falls within the Concurrent List, but this patchwork looks less like a defensible division of powers than a refusal to legislate — and commuters are paying the price.

That cost is most........

© National Herald