The Karnataka High Court permitted bike taxis to operate in the state, allowing a batch of petitions filed by cab aggregators Ola, Uber and Rapido against the ban on the service. The bench held that bikes used for taxi services fell within the definition of “transport vehicles” under the Motor Vehicles Act.

The state government cannot deny them permits on the grounds that bikes were not transport vehicles, said the court. Bike taxi operators could file applications to get contract carriage permits to operate motorcycles as bike taxis, it added.

In April, a single-judge bench ordered all bike taxi services to stop operations in Karnataka. The court had referred to a 2019 expert committee report, which considered the impact of bike taxis on traffic and safety. Unless the state government frames rules and guidelines to permit bike taxis, such vehicles cannot be permitted, the court had held. Read on.

Bike taxis are exploding in India – but are facing government roadblocks, writes Vineet Bhalla.

The Indian rupee fell to an all-time record low of 91.9 against the United States dollar. The Indian currency, sliding 41 paise during the day, continued to lose its value amid foreign fund outflows and risk aversion triggered by geopolitical tensions.

Speculative buying of the dollar by offshore players had also contributed to the fall. The rupee fell more than 1% this week as foreign investors have withdrawn about $3.5 billion from Indian equities in January so far. Read on.

The Bombay High Court granted bail to Kabil Kala Manch artists Sagar Gorkhe and Ramesh Gaichor, who are accused in the 2018 Bhima Koregaon case. A division bench allowed their bail application on the grounds of long incarceration.

Gorkhe and Gaichor were arrested in September 2020. The court was hearing their plea against a February 2022 order of a special National Investigation Agency court that denied them bail.

The NIA has accused Gaichor of using the Elgar Parishad event on December 31, 2017, to make inflammatory speeches to incite violence and “propagate Naxal activities and Maoist ideology”. It has alleged that Gorkhe used his cultural song and dance performances to propagate Maoist ideology. Read on.

The Delhi High Court set aside the bail granted to a Muslim man accused of being involved in clashes and stone-throwing during a demolition drive near a mosque and a graveyard at Turkman Gate in the national capital on January 7. The clashes had broken out when the Municipal Corporation of Delhi was carrying out the demolition on land adjoining the Faiz Elahi mosque.

The 25-year-old man, Ubedullah, was among the 18 persons arrested in the case. He was booked under sections of Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita pertaining to rioting and attempt to murder.

On Tuesday, Ubedullah was granted bail by a trial court, just a week after it denied bail to five other persons accused in the case. The High Court said that the trial court’s order was “cryptic and unreasoned” and had not addressed the prosecution’s arguments. It directed the trial court to reconsider the man’s plea. Read on.

The toll in the crackdown on the recent protests in Iran is at least 5,000, human rights activists have said. This would make the ongoing protests the deadliest unrest in Iran in several decades.

The protests, which began on December 28, initially focused on discontent about rising inflation. However, they later expanded as protesters in more than 100 towns demanded an end to clerical rule.

The United States-based Human Rights Activists News Agency has said that the toll includes more than 4,700 protesters, over 200 demonstrators affiliated to the Iranian government, 43 children and 40 civilians who had not participated in the unrest. Read on.

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