The Karnataka electric bicycle taxi scheme, launched in 2021 with a cheerful promise of clean, green and last mile mobility, has now been towed silently off the road. What began as a serious attempt to boost ecological transport was soon lost in a labyrinth of regulatory lagoons, execution lapses and the type of grass wars that only Indian urban transport can really deliver. By March 2024, the Government had thrown from the spark plug, citing a true buffet of reasons for misuse or gasoline bicycles of white boards disguising itself from electric taxis to safety conerns and a self -transport trip. What was supposed to be a soft electric buzz of progress became a awkwardly thick fuel disorder, complete with illegal walks, grunt unions and agitated regulators.
Instead of a fleet of Zippy and skilled electronic bicycles that solve the old problem or how to get from the metro station to its forehead (without stepping on an open caterpillar), Karnataka found himself fighting for a complete differential. The private bicycles of the white -opten-oppten bicycles, and clearly violated the motorized vehicle law, accumulated the streets, many that operate under the bike taxi umbrella without a pinch of legal coverage. The confrontations between the riders and the traditional drivers of Auto-Rickshaw began to emerge, sometimes they result in literal street battles for the territory. The safety of women was marked as an important group, although one could argue that being in a two -wheel open vehicle is less claustrophobic and, therefore, safer to be closed inside a crossing car with a moody driver.
Then there was the question of the interest of the aggregator, or the lack of it. Only one company also bothered to request a license, and they also win midway, as a student who leaves his thesis in the middle of chapter one. Then, the siege of the government of influential influential politician Rickshaw and taxis unions armed his favorite tool: the prohibition of the blanket. It does not matter that this effectively crushed not only the illegal taxis of gasoline bicycles, but also the electric future that the policy was designed to dizzy.
In April 2025, Karnataka is caught in what can only be described as a policy bump, one that seems unable or that is not willing to pave. On the one hand, there is a clear and present need of affordable, flexible and last mile mobility options. On the other hand, there is bureaucracy, regulatory confusion and the formidable anger of car unions. For the close average, those that once, although with letters, trusted the bicycle taxis to get to work, subway, bus stop, university or home, the abrupt reversion has been more than insignified; It is a directly exasperating leg. It cannot prohibit a solution without offering an alternative, but that has never carried the government’s operational logic.
It is not as if Karnataka could not have looked around and thrown one or two pages of other Indian states. Goa has had its “pilots” for decades: bicycle taxis with yellow and cyclists plates in uniform, bringing narrow bylanes and transporting places and tourists equally. The cities in the northwest, Shillong and Aizawl, for example, have adapted the bicycle taxis brilliantly, using them to navigate mountain and thread through adjusted urban groups. And yet, in Bengaluru, a city that is marketed as the technological capital of India, the entire scheme was discarded instead of being fixed. Instead of safeguarding in place (mandatory identification, safety vests, GPS monitoring or simply yellow boards), the government chose to throw the baby, bath water and bathtub out the window.
The repeated justification that white bicycles violate the motorized vehicle law sounds quite hollow when seen in context. Moscow, the duration of the Soviet era, worked with a delicious chaos of ladas that doubled as informal taxis, and no one seemed worse for that. Here in India, when low -income people find an honest way of making a living, especially in an area where the State has not been able to provide basic infrastructure, it is not only myopic, but almost comical to close them in a technicalism. Particularly when those same people are plug -in gaps in the connectivity of last mile and create a self -conflict where there was none.
Meanwhile, Public Transport of Bengaluru continues to bearing. The Metro, which now covers about 77 kilometers through the city, reaches only around 23% of residents at a short distance and covers less than 6% of the total area of the city. Expansion plans look good on paper and bright brochures, but travelers do not travel through PowerPoint. They need options that work today. BMTC, the life of the city bus, is overloaded, sub -financed and in many areas, absent from virtuaxia. Buses are overcrowded or missing mysteriously, and in new designs and external areas, they remain as strange as specific contractors.
In this disaster, the bicycle taxis were a god: fast, cheap and agile, special in the famous apocalyptic traffic of Bengaluru. They could weave through potholes, sneak around stagnations and sacrifice relief to people who otherwise have to walk kilometers from a metropolitan stop or negotiate with cars that prefer not to make short distances. However, instead of adjusting the rules and improving the application, the government simply prohibited everything.
To add a final iony note, the State had once promised its own transport application to counteract high commissions charged by private platforms such as OLA and Uber. But like most government technological projects, it is a “developing” bone for more than a year, trapped somewhere between the meetings of the committee and coding confusion. I looked, aggregators as fast insist that they operate in a legal gray area, the government insists that they are not, and users are scratching their heads, they are not sure if their next trip will appear imposed.
In March 2025, private transport unions once again to the government door demand a total prohibition of bicycle taxis and a reduction in road taxes to prevent vehicles from registering in neighboring states. And so, the Push and Pull game continues, with the real caht in the middle.
However, let’s be clear: although bicycle taxi operators have a fair case, they must also the line, in the sensible parts of the law that everyone else follows. Playing for the rules is not just about legality, it is long -term credibility. If really because to embed tremors in the urban transport matrix of India, they need to demonstrate that they are interested parties of response, not only dishonest pilots in interested wheels.
In fact, Karnataka’s experiment with electric bicycle taxis was not a total failure, it was a lost opportunity. He showed that people are hungry for alternatives, for cleaner, faster and more affordable options. But until policies can follow the rhythm of innovation, and until the government learns to regulate with a scalpel instead of a sled hammer, the road to progress will be directed with speed blows. And that, dear reader, is a shame.
Discharge of responsibility
The opinions expressed above are the author’s own.
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