A bill has been drafted by the government of Sindh to bring the ride-hailing services, Uber and Careem under the ambit of law. Summary regarding this matter has also been forwarded to Murad Ali Shah, Chief Minister of Sindh.
It should be noted that this summary also includes the information regarding Uber that it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Transport and Mass Transit Department (TMTD) regarding the use of its digital lead generation services. Apart from this, Careem has approached TMTD in order to get the fitness certificates and route permits to 500 of its vehicles.
In Sindh, both Uber and Careem have been operating as “Online Public Passenger Service”. However, it should be highlighted that under the Motor Vehicles Rules of 1969 none of the vehicles has such provision to be used for such services.
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Therefore, a bill has been drafted for this purpose and is forwarded to the Law Department and Chief Minister of Sindh in order for the bill to get approved and so that it can further be forwarded for the legislation to the cabinet and the provincial Assembly.
In order for these ride-hailing taxi service to get commercial, a bill has been drafted according to the notification issued by the transport and mass transit department. By this step, these ride-hailing rides would become commercial and would be liable to pay taxes.
Once the proposed bill regarding online taxi service is formally legislated, only then the vehicles will have to be registered and follow the laws outlined by the transport department, said Awais Qadir Shah, Minister for Transport and Mass Transit.
The minister also said that these ride-hailing companies would also have to get insurance for both their passengers and belongings.
Mr Shah also stated that “Non-commercial vehicles will no longer be able to function as taxis and quality of the services provided by these companies will also be improved”. He further mentioned that these vehicles would obtain their route permits through private online taxi services.
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