Legal

Partner Privacy Notice

Effective 8 August 2026 · Vidhilekha Lab LLP · India only

This notice describes how Bharat School Ride handles the personal data of partner drivers — the people who drive school vans and buses on our platform. If you are a parent using Bharat School Ride, the notice that applies to you is our Privacy Policy.

Bharat School Ride is offered only in India. This notice is written for Indian law and applies only to partner drivers in India.

I. Overview

1. Who this notice applies to

This notice applies to you if you:

• have applied to become a partner driver, including by messaging us on WhatsApp or through the Drive with us page;
• are onboarded as a partner driver and use the Bharat School Ride driver app; or
• own or operate a vehicle that runs on the platform.

2. Who is responsible for your data

Vidhilekha Lab LLP, a limited liability partnership registered in India, operates Bharat School Ride and is the Data Fiduciary for the personal data described here. You are the Data Principal. Contact: info@vidhilekhalab.com.

3. The short version

• We collect what a school-transport safety platform needs: who you are, that you are verified to drive children, and what happens on a trip.
• Location is collected only while a trip is running, not when you are off duty.
• We never sell, rent, or trade your data, and we never use it for advertising or profiling.
• Parents see the safety information they need to trust the ride — not your personal contact details, documents, or off-duty whereabouts.

II. Data we collect

4. Data you give us

• Application details — name, mobile number, city, and anything you tell us in your WhatsApp message or during onboarding calls.
• Identity and eligibility documents — commercial driving licence, police verification or clearance certificate, and a photograph used on your Bharat School Ride ID badge and in the parent app.
• Vehicle documents — registration certificate, fitness certificate, permit, insurance, and the records of our safety inspection and fittings.
• Training records — attendance and completion of child-safety and first-aid training.
• Payment details, only if you ask us to collect fees — bank account or UPI details, so we can pay you what we collect on your behalf. If you keep collecting fees from parents yourself, we do not need or ask for these.

5. Data created when you use the platform

• Trip location. The driver app records the vehicle's GPS location at short intervals while a trip is active, so parents can follow the ride in real time. Collection starts when you begin a trip and stops when you end it. The app does not collect your location when you are off duty.
• Driving data. Speed and driving patterns during trips, used to flag unsafe driving such as speeding or harsh braking.
• Trip events. Pickup and drop events with timestamps, attendance marked for each child, route taken, and trip start and end times.
• Device and app data. Device model, operating system version, app version, mobile network type, crash logs, and diagnostic information.
• Communications. Messages you exchange with us on WhatsApp, support requests, and call records with our operations team.

6. Data we receive from others

• Parents — ratings, feedback, and complaints about a ride.
• Verification agencies and authorities — the outcome of licence checks with the RTO and police verification.
• Schools and societies — where a school or residents' association arranges routes, the route and stop information they share with us.
• Vehicle owners — where you drive a van you do not own, the owner may share your name and licence details when adding you to the vehicle.

III. How we use your data

7. Purposes

• Verification and safety. To confirm you are licensed, verified, and trained to carry children, and to keep those checks current.
• Running rides. To assign routes, show parents live tracking, send pickup and drop alerts, and mark attendance.
• Accountability. To review flagged driving, investigate a parent's complaint, and act on repeated safety issues.
• Payments. Where you have asked us to collect fees on your behalf, to collect from parents and pay you, and to keep the monthly account.
• Support and communication. To answer your questions, tell you about training and inspections, and send service updates.
• Legal and emergency. To meet legal obligations, respond to lawful requests from authorities, and act in an emergency involving a child or a vehicle.
• Improving the service. To fix bugs and improve the driver app, using aggregated or de-identified data wherever it will do.

We do not use your data for advertising, and we do not sell or rent it to anyone.

8. What parents can see about you

Parents whose children ride with you see:

• your name, photo, and verification status;
• the vehicle you are driving and its safety-check status; and
• the live location of the vehicle during their child's trip, with pickup and drop alerts.

Parents do not see your personal mobile number, your documents, your bank or UPI details, your home address, or where you are outside an active trip.

IV. Sharing and disclosure

9. Who we share data with

• Parents — as described in section 8.
• Schools, societies, and vehicle owners — verification status and trip records for the routes they are responsible for.
• Service providers — companies that host our systems, deliver WhatsApp notifications, provide maps and location services, send login OTPs, and process payments where you have opted into fee collection. Each receives only what its function requires and is bound by contract and its own privacy terms.
• Verification agencies — to run licence and background checks.
• Authorities — police, transport authorities, or courts, where the law requires it or where it is needed to respond to an emergency or a serious safety incident.
• In a business transfer — if the business or part of it is transferred, your data may move with it, subject to this notice.

10. Where your data is kept

Bharat School Ride operates only in India and your data is stored and processed in India. Where a service provider processes data outside India, we do so only as permitted by Indian law and under contractual protections.

V. Retention and deletion

11. How long we keep things

• Application details — kept while your application is open, and for up to 12 months after if you do not join, so we can contact you when routes open in your area. Ask us and we will delete them sooner.
• Verification and vehicle records — kept for as long as you drive on the platform and afterwards for as long as the law and our safety obligations require.
• Trip and driving records — kept for the duration of the service plus 12 months, then deleted or anonymised.
• Live location — retained as part of the trip record; the high-frequency location stream is purged on a rolling basis.
• Payment records — where we collect fees on your behalf, retained for the period required by tax and accounting law.

12. Deleting your data

You can ask us to delete your account and personal data at any time — see Delete Account or email info@vidhilekhalab.com. We will delete what we are not required to keep. Records tied to a child's safety, a legal obligation, or an unresolved incident are retained for as long as that requirement lasts, and then deleted.

VI. Your choices and rights

13. Your rights

• Access — ask for a summary of the personal data we hold about you and who we have shared it with.
• Correction — have inaccurate or incomplete data corrected or updated.
• Erasure — ask us to delete data we no longer need to keep.
• Withdraw consent — withdraw a consent you gave. Some withdrawals mean we can no longer let you drive on the platform: without location during trips, for example, parents cannot be given the live tracking the service exists to provide.
• Nominate — nominate someone to exercise these rights on your behalf if you die or become incapacitated.
• Grievance redressal — raise a complaint with us, as below.

Write to info@vidhilekhalab.com and we will respond within 30 days.

14. Controls in the app

• Location permission. The driver app needs location permission to run trips. You can turn it off in your phone settings at any time; while it is off, you cannot run trips on the platform.
• Notifications. You can turn off non-essential notifications and keep only safety and trip alerts.
• Fee collection. Whether we collect fees on your behalf is your choice, and you can change it. If you stop, we stop needing your bank or UPI details.

VII. Security, grievances, and changes

15. Security

Data moves over encrypted connections (HTTPS/TLS). Access inside our team is role-based, and logins use phone OTP. If a breach affects your personal data, we will notify you and the authorities as required by law.

16. Grievance officer

If you are not satisfied with our response, you may complain to the Data Protection Board of India under the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023.

17. Changes to this notice

We will announce material changes on this website and, where you are an active partner, in the driver app or by WhatsApp. The effective date above always reflects the latest version.