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A special bench of the Delhi High Court heard submissions related to compliance of its previous orders on a petition filed by taxi service provider Magic Seva Private Limited against taxi aggregators and the Delhi government today. Magic Seva had earlier approached the high court seeking a remedy to flagrant violations of the City Taxi Scheme 2015 by taxi aggregators, which lays down maximum taxi fares that may be charged in the national capital.
The petitioner had also raised additional concerns regarding safety of passengers using such taxi aggregator services and critiqued both the service providers as well as the government for repeated failures to address such issues. At the end of the previous hearing on the petition, the court had issued orders to all taxi service providers directing the submission of comprehensive lists of driver details in the NCR region for police verification of driving licences and criminal antecedents.
The aggregators were also directed to submit details of vehicle registrations and insurance policies to be verified by the transport department. In today's hearing, the parties informed the court as to what actions have been taken by them in compliance of the prior orders. After these initial submissions were made, the petitioner counsel attempted to begin regular arguments on the remaining issues, which the court refused to entertain at this juncture.
"If substantial compliance has been achieved,then something good has happened already. We cannot hear the entire matter at this time at the cost of poor citizens. The rest can be heard in due course before the regular bench," said Justice J R Midha, reminding the advocate for Magic Seva that the present hearing was scheduled only for ensuring that previous directions had been followed.
The court then listed the matter before the roster bench for regular hearing on 30th August.
