No cash for vegetables? No issues.
You can buy any quantity of vegetables, and other groceries available at Rythu Bazaars in the capital.
All that you need is your Aadhar card number linked with your bank account.
Just go to any Rythu Bazaar and give your details to the T-Seva services person in-charge (located mostly at the entrance).
He will key in the details into the machine -which looks like tablet albeit bigger in size.
Fingerprints
Your fingerprints would be scanned. It will take a few seconds for the machine to verify details and process them.
You can choose the amount ranging from Rs. 100 to Rs. 5,000. Depending on the amount, the person will give you tokens (small pieces of paper with value mentioned on it) of Rs. 5, Rs. 10 and Rs. 20 denominations. Instead of cash, give the tokens to the vendor equivalent to the vegetables purchased. Telangana Marketing Department has introduced the token system at Rythu Bazaars, encouraging cashless transactions.
Convincing act
Retired engineer Harivardhan Rao tried the option rather hesitantly but found it useful. “It is surely useful but some vendors are not ready to accept the tokens I gave. I have to convince them,” he said.
Mr. Rao wondered what the vendors would do with the tokens.
At the end of the day, the vendors will go to the T-Seva services operator, present all the tokens and take equivalent cash.
“Most of the vendors at the Rytu Bazaar are rural women. Those refusing to take tokens are not aware of the system introduced. We’re counselling them,” explained Rythu Bazaar supervisor Balraju.
The cashless transactions system at Rytu Bazaars was working smoothly but there were not many takers.
While hundreds of people come to Rythu Bazaar each day, the number of persons using the cashless transactions did not cross even 30 a day.
On the first day, the figure was 22, next day it was 20. By 3 p.m. on Thursday, only five customers used it.
“Not many know about the new system. And people have doubts in their minds about what happens to left over token and their validity period,” said Satyanarayana.
