The Delhi government is planning to partner with online grocery startups like Grofers and BigBasket and private companies like JioMart for door-to-door delivery of rations to 1.7 million households in the city.
The Arvind Kejriwal led state has been conducting online meets with some potential firms and have contacted others via letters to confirm if they were willing to partner in the Mukhyamantri Ghar Ghar Ration Yojana, as reported by ET (1).
A senior executive of the top online grocery platform said,
“That meeting was just to brief us on what their requirements were…. their criteria was companies should be able to handle end-of-end logistics of the program as they are trying to modernize the PDS.”
He said that the video conference led by Delhi officials was held last month and was attended representative from online grocery platforms and some large online logistics firms.
Great opportunity for firms to convert households into customers
According to the plans, the government will be providing subsidized, and packaged food staples, including flour, rice and sugar, and ecommerce firms would be using their supply chain to deliver to the households.
If the deal comes through, Delhi would be amongst the latest among states to have partnered with private firms to modernize the PDS system.
This serves as a major chance for online grocery platforms to convert many households into their customers.
Earlier in 2015, Future Group tied up with the Rajasthan govt to manage the state’s ration and PDS shops, and later in 2018, the company also tied up the Bengal govt to convert ration shops into mini-malls, where non-PDS items were sold as a discounted price.
