Moneycontrol | Karnataka’s plan to fix prices for Uber-Ola cabs is going to boomerang badly

There’s ridiculous and then, there’s this! In a long list of antagonist policy decisions taken against cab-aggregators by Indian state governments, the latest one by the Karnataka government takes the cake. In a policy that plans to emulate the pricing structure of the city’s autos, the Karnataka government plans to fix prices for all taxis in the state. In the new fare structure, all taxis will be categorised into three segments based on the purchase value of the vehicle and the prices will be fixed for each segment. Read the full article here.

Moneycontrol | Don’t rush to mimic Rajasthan gig workers law

The devil, as they often say, is in the details. And so it is with the The Rajasthan Platform Based Gig Workers (Registration and Welfare) Act 2023, passed in the Rajasthan Assembly on July 24 to nearly universal fanfare. The need for some form of social security measures for gig workers was so acutely felt that this Act is currently lauded with messianic zeal just for the good intentions behind the law. There is a good chance that other states will follow suit and therefore, a closer scrutiny can instruct areas for improvement. Read the full article here.

Mint | Indian gig workers ought to get a well-crafted social security net

Rajasthan’s new law governing the welfare of gig workers has much to commend it. Not only is it necessary to support India’s growing 21st century workforce, it also offers us a way to reform our 18th century labour law regime. As Takshashila Institution’s Anupam Manur puts it, the term ‘gig work’ is a misnomer in our country—for most of the people driving taxis, delivering food or household services via online aggregator platforms, that is their main occupation. Employment in this segment is growing. The Niti Aayog expects 200% growth in gig employment by 2030. Based on possibilities I see emerging from what is happening in Bengaluru, I think that is a conservative estimate. While the fates of individual aggregator platforms may rise and fall, the gig model is an important part of how India creates mass employment. Read the full article here.

Road Ahead for UPI: Free Public Infrastructure or Yet Another Payment Mechanism?

With its widespread adoption, UPI is now here to stay. Regulators must now switch their focus on ensuring fair competition in the digital payments space. The zero-charge framework gives UPI an advantage over other digital payments and a big task for regulators is to determine how it can be phased out going forward. With the market currently dominated by a handful of players at the front-end (GPay, PhonePe, Paytm) and monopolised by NPCI and banks at the back-end, enabling competition in each layer of UPI to tackle this would be the sensible direction to take for UPI to sustain on its own.

Countering Hate In The Digital World

Ongoing police investigations to identify the culprits behind the condemnable “Bulli Bai” and “Sulli Deals” apps, which “auctioned” several prominent and vocal Muslim women, implicate individuals born close to the turn of the century. At first glance, this indicates that digital natives are not resilient against problems such as disinformation, hate speech and the potential for radicalisation that plague our informational spaces. But placed within the broader context of decreasing levels of social cohesion in Indian society, that such apps were even created requires us to frame our understanding in a way that can point us towards the right set of long-term interventions.