Last month, I watched a video that’s been making rounds on WhatsApp: A tourist in Goa getting quoted ₹1,600 for what should’ve been a ₹500 ride. This Goa taxi reel comments were brutal. “Taxi mafia,” “Never going back to Goa,” “This is why we need Ola/Uber.” But here’s the thing: There’s a whole story here about community, livelihood, and what happens when Silicon Valley’s playbook meets India’s ground realities.
The Problem Everyone Talks About:
Goa’s taxi situation is broken. We’ve all hit that wall: You land at the airport, dying to get to your hotel, and then bam: you’re caught in this bizarre negotiation where the rules seem to change depending on your accent and how utterly lost you look.
A 2023 survey done by the Goa Tourism Development Corporation provided insights that 81% of tourists hate the transport system in Goa. The story wouldn’t be different even if it’s 2025. Probably, this number may even touch 90% today. That’s not “room for improvement” territory. That’s “we have a serious problem” territory. For a state that lives off tourism, annoying four out of five visitors is not great business. Simply find out online about Cab experiences in Goa, and you’ll see the facts people have experienced.
The usual suspects get blamed: no meters, non-controlled pricing, drivers who act like they’re doing you a favor by taking your money. I’ve heard stories that would make you want to walk everywhere. But Here’s What Most People Don’t Get. The taxi operators have an “cooperative model”, essentially an unwritten agreement where drivers don’t get into territorial poaching. If you drop someone off in Panaji and you’re based in Calangute, you don’t pick up a return passenger. Rather than tacking it on later, you build that cost into the initial fare. Sure, it might seem a bit old-school, maybe even clunky, but it’s surprisingly fair, as everyone does get a piece of the action. Nobody’s territory gets poached. Everyone’s family eats.
Problem? Tourists hate it!
The Radio Trap:
Now, Goan drivers aren’t stupid. They’ve seen what happened in Bangalore and Mumbai. Uber and Ola roll into town, throw venture capital money around like confetti, undercut everyone, and then once they’ve killed the competition? Squeeze time. In Bangalore, drivers went from making decent money to working 12-hour days for ₹20,000 a month after expenses. The apps were taking 25-30% commissions. Drivers had no control over their schedules, their routes, or their prices. T
hey became digital coolies. And these platforms didn’t just compete on service; instead, they competed on subsidies. They were losing money on every ride, funded by investors who could afford to lose millions to capture market share. How do you compete with that when you’re just a guy with a Maruti Suzuki trying to feed his family?
Goa Taxi remedy:
So what did Goa do? They said, “We’ll make our apps.”. And now we have plenty of government-aided and private apps on the Play Store. The state just launched another app, ‘Goa Taxi Driver’, too, throwing in free fuel for early adopters.
GoaMiles has been around for seven years now. It’s got over 4,000 taxis, empowering 528 women, handles 15,000 passengers daily, and drivers apparently make around ₹50,000 a month. That’s way better than what radio cab drivers make in most cities.
Is it a perfect solution? Possibly No. Only about 5,000 of the state’s 12,000 tourist taxis are on any app-based platform. That means more than half are still operating the old way: no transparency, no accountability, no idea what you’re gonna pay until you’re already in the car, or if your luck runs out, towards the end of the trip.
But there’s a wave. At least they’re trying something different. Instead of just letting Silicon Valley eat their lunch, they’re attempting to modernize while keeping the benefits local.
The Real Messiness:
The Goan system isn’t just about protecting drivers, it’s about protecting a whole way of life. These aren’t just individual contractors trying to make a buck. They’re part of communities. Extended families. Support networks.
When a driver falls ill, the community comes together to help. When someone’s car breaks down, there are informal credit systems. When the tourist season ends, people look out for each other. It’s messy and inefficient and sometimes unfair to outsiders, but it’s also human in a way that app-based work isn’t.
Compare that to the gig economy model, where you’re just a rating and a car. No community, no safety net, no guarantee that the platform won’t change the rules tomorrow. I’m not saying Goan taxi drivers are angels. Some of them rip off tourists, and plenty of online proof is available. The lack of meters is inexcusable. The inconsistent pricing is frustrating as hell. Something needs to change. But maybe the solution isn’t to just let Uber and Ola steamroll in and disrupt everything. Maybe there’s a middle path.
Both apps recently switched to subscription models (Zero commission model as they called it), instead of taking commissions, they charge drivers a flat daily fee and let them keep 100% of fares. Sounds good, right? Except now drivers are paying upfront costs whether they get rides or not. The risk has shifted from the platform to the worker.
And surge pricing? Still a thing. In Bangalore, people are apparently losing ₹2.4 crore daily to overcharging despite court orders trying to stop it. So much for the efficiency of the free market.
Solution, one step at a time:
Making meters mandatory. Period. Getting more drivers onto transparent platforms. Half the fleet still operating in the shadows isn’t good for anyone. Enforcing standardized pricing. You can’t have a functioning market when nobody knows what anything costs. But you’ve got to see the cooperative that these drivers have? It’s not just an obstacle. It’s a smart system they’ve created to share financial risk and keep things running smoothly amongst themselves. So, instead of tearing it down, let’s look at how to upgrade it. Make it clearer, more answerable, and fairer for everyone involved, which is for the drivers and riders. Goa’s taxi wars aren’t really about apps or technology. They’re about who gets to control the future of work in India.
Do we want a system where a few platform companies extract value from everyone else? Or can we build something that serves communities? There may not be a solution at this point. After all, the best solutions often come from the places that refuse to choose between tradition and progress; they find a way to have both.
In case you are in Goa and looking for authentic Goan Cashew nuts and Goan liquor, check out our posts.
Image Credit: Emanuel Pedro
Arjun Naik