The increased adoption of two-wheelers as ride-sharing options have the potential to generate over 2 million livelihoods with expected revenue of $4.5 billion, ride-hailing platform Ola Mobility Institute said in a detailed report on Tuesday.
The report, titled
The report focuses on two-wheelers as a mainstream shared mobility solution, considering the widespread use of bikes across the country.
According to the report, one in three Indians use two-wheelers for their daily commute to and from work. “Two-wheelers constitute 81 per cent of the automobiles sold in India, thereby, becoming one of the leading contributors to India’s GDP,” the report further said.
“India has one of the largest number of two-wheelers plying on the roads in the world,” said Anand Shah, Head, Ola Mobility Institute. “Shared mobility and hyperlocal delivery are witnessing strong uptake and bikes have emerged as the preferred choice for both passenger and goods movement. The report comes at a critical time when India needs to create 55-60 lakh new jobs annually over the next decade. Bike taxis will be key in achieving this target, democratising access to mobility and building an inclusive mobility ecosystem.”
Legitimising bike taxis could reduce traffic congestion and parking space problems, apart from the economic opportunities that it would generate. The widespread adoption of bike-sharing services can be in the form of bike-taxis.
The report further suggests the steps that need to be taken in governing bike taxis as a mobility category. The Centre should provide “coherent legal clarity, integration of public transit systems, allowing access to formal credit for driver entrepreneurs and creating a level-playing field for all stakeholders,” it said.
The Centre has paved the way for states to create policies for bike-taxi operations. However, currently, only a few states and Union Territories have regulated this category, according to the report.
Further, tech-enabled shared mobility platforms will play a crucial role in bringing about the bike taxi revolution.
“The demand-responsive mobility industry (India’s new mobility market in the form of technology-enabled ride-hailing, ridesharing, corporate sharing, P2P vehicle sharing, mobility-as-a-service, all forms of taxi services, etc.) is expected to touch $90 bn by 2030. Undoubtedly, super-apps and aggregator models are the harbingers of the 2W revolution,” the report said
The report is based on an empirical analysis of bike taxi operations in Gurugram and Jaipur. The study found that bike taxis are an ideal first-mile transportation solution as 70-85 per cent of customers prefer to use bike-taxis for distances of less than 7 km.