PIL wants delivery agents monitored; Madras high court orders notice

A public interest writ petition in Madras high court has sought to regulate and monitor delivery agents of food and grocery platforms such as Swiggy, Zomato, Dunzo and Zepto, and frame guidelines for the trade.

Justice P Velmurugan, before whom the PIL filed by L N Nithyananthami of Pudukottai came up for hearing on Thursday, admitted the plea, and directed the Tamil Nadu DGP and delivery platforms Swiggy, Zomato, Dunzo, and Zepto to respond to the plea in four weeks and adjourned the hearing. .

The PIL said that in recent days, crimes committed by people pretending to be delivery personnel are alarming and hence need to be curtailed by formulating guidelines.

"Recently, it was widely published in the media that a prominent political person was murdered by individuals wearing uniforms of such delivery partners. A lot of chain-snatching and other crimes are also committed by people wearing such uniforms," argued his counsel P Chandrasekaran on Thursday.

Delivery agents who come to deliver food or groceries wear the uniform of the respective delivery platforms, but they don't have any identity card displaying their name and other details, he said.

"Many times, they don't wear the uniform of the respective delivery platform. Most of the time, they deliver the products wearing helmets, making it difficult to identify them," Chandrasekaran added.

Normally, people will become suspicious if an unknown person goes to a house or is found on the streets, but one cannot raise suspicion if he is a delivery person in uniform. People will think he/she is waiting for a delivery is searching for the address, the petitioner said.

"Because of this advantage, it is very easy for them to roam freely unnoticed and commit a crime," he added.