After 16 long years, 32,000 new taxis will be unloaded on the roads, as dead permits would be revived through a lottery system. To ensure the operation goes smoothly, the department is in talks with Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (MHADA), for borrowing the software the latter uses for its housing lotteries.

“We are taking the help of MHADA for this software that would require some alterations. This is for the first time that we will be issuing permits through a lottery system, and so we are trying to cover all the bases,” said a representative of the transport department, on condition of anonymity. Authorities claim that currently, the software used by MHADA asks for several details from a prospective homebuyer, including income and related information. They maintained that though the skeleton of this software would remain about the same, it would be fleshed out differently.