The challenges presented to daily life from the lockdown enforced to keep COVID-19 at bay has led the Mysuru City Corporation (MCC) to begin geo-mapping of shops selling essential items including groceries, vegetables and fruits and dairy products, and medical stores, which can later be developed into virtual storefronts.
Though the present exercise is only aimed at helping people locate on the MCC’s app – My Clean City – the nearest grocery, vegetable or medical store open during the lockdown, MCC Commissioner Gurudatta Hegde said itwill help the citizens even after the lockdown period ends.
The Revenue Inspectors of MCC have begun physically geo-tagging each essential store in their respective localities by taking photographs and uploading the details including the telephone numbers. The essential stores are being categorised under Grocery Shops, Milk Booth, Pharmacy, Vegetable Stall, Fruit Stall, Hospitals, Petrol Bunks, and Super Markets categories on the My Clean City app.
Geo-mapping facilitates the authorities to also assess the supply side of essential commodities in each area of the city under the present circumstances. “We will know in which area the supplies are less. Or in which area the shops are not open. In such places, we can deploy pushcarts with essential supplies or make alternative arrangements like press into service a mobile store”, Mr. Hegde said.
Virtual storefront
A private initiative is underway to geo-map not only thousands of stores in Mysuru, but millions more across the country on cityonnet.com, an omni-channel marketplace, which seeks to provide a virtual storefront to its users.
The Mysuru-based founder of Cityonnet.com Satheesh Ramanna told The Hindu that it already had more than 300 grocery stores in the city under its Grocery and Staples category.
The stores listed in its website not only show the products available with them, but also the prices they are charging. Though the option of making purchases online and having them delivered to the doorstep of the user is still not available, Mr. Ramanna said users can contact the store and confirm if it can deliver.
The website, which is working on geo-mapping 4,500 stores in Mysuru, is also engaged in covering the stores across 650 cities in the country. “We are just out of stealth mode and in a Go to the Market state. We have provided a virtual storefront to more than a million stores and we are in the process of getting them activated”, he said.
