7,843 taxi permits given away by lottery draw

A lottery draw for 7,843 taxi permits was held on Saturday evening. If the process of issuing permits goes as planned, then, from January 2015, there should be as many new cabs on the roads of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region.

In the last couple of years, the transport department had cancelled 19,687 taxi permits, of which 4,000 permits were put out for phone fleet operators. "Fifty per cent of the balance permits, that is 7,843 permits, have been allotted through a lottery draw on Saturday. The procedure has been similar to the online auto rickshaw permit application and lottery draw," informed a senior official.

Out of the total permits, 7,747 have been won by men, 95 by women and 1 by a transgender. Winners received text messages on their mobiles informing them about having won a permit.

A total of 27,087 applications were received online for 7,843 permits. The process had begun on September 6.

Applicants have welcomed online applications for auto and taxi permits as it rules out the involvement of touts in the process, thereby making it a transparent and fair process. Once the draw is conducted, the applications of the winners and those on the waiting list will be sent to the respective RTOs for submission and scrutiny of documents.

If the documents are matching the criteria, permits would be issued to the winner.