The Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) has allowed home deliveries, mandatorily cashless, in the city from May 15. Cash on delivery will be banned and digital transactions will be mandatory for home deliveries in an effort to contain the spread of Covid-19 through currency notes. Nearly 17,000 retail shops in the city, too, will be encouraged to transact in digital payment modes from May 15, once the complete lockdown that was imposed on May 7 is lifted, according to the order issued by Rajiv Kumar Gupata, additional chief secretary forest and environment, who is in charge of Ahmedabad. “Nearly 40,000 home deliveries are made everyday in Ahmedabad city by over a dozen agencies such as BigBasket, BigBazaar, Reliance, Flourish, D-Mart, Swiggy and Zomato. The important new directive is for them. Cash on delivery has been banned as coronavirus can spread through currency notes. For home delivery, cashless payment is mandatory,” said Additional Chief Secretary forest and environment Rajiv Kumar Gupta who is in charge of Ahmedabad. “We have made cashless payments mandatory for all home deliveries and will encourage retail shops, too, to follow the same and use currency notes in a very controlled environment. A separate guideline with detailed instructions for shops will be issued tomorrow (Tuesday) to address all these,” a senior AMC official clarified. Later in the day, the AMC tweeted, “For over 17,000 vendors, Digital Mode of Payment (UPI) is advisable. However, cash payment can be made maintaining social distancing.” “As part of preparatory strategy after lockdown, all the major retail and home delivery agencies such as D-Mart, Osia Hypermarket, Zomato and Swiggy have been asked to get 100 per cent screening of the delivery staff. As an abundant caution to prevent coronavirus spread through currency notes, digital mode of payments through Unified Payment Interface (UPI) and other platforms have been made mandatory. Home delivery will be mandatorily cashless from May 15,” the order issued by Gupta states. The protocol for home deliveries also states that no delivery boy should be enlisted from containment areas and every delivery staff will have to download Arogya Setu App on their mobile phones. Health cards by AMC will be issued for a period of seven days and these need to be renewed from time to time. Health screening, social distancing, use of gloves, sanitation cap and sanitiser are also compulsory for them. Around 11,000 super-spreaders were screened by the AMC and suspected cases have been separated, Gupta said. For around 17,000 retail shops of vegetables, fruits, milk and groceries, AMC has made 150 teams that will reach out to them to get online payment apps installed in their mobile phones, give technical support and popularise payment through UPI. Separate guidelines will be notified for retail sales from May 15. Ahmedabad city was put under a complete lockdown for a week from May 7. Barring milk and medicine shops, everything remains closed in the city till May 14. All branches of all banks except ATMs also remain closed in the red zones till further notice.
