THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The lingering technical glitches in the Electronic Point of Sale (EPoS) machines have been affecting the proper functioning of ration shops in the state for the past six months, with the customers, mostly from weaker sections of society, facing hardships.
With the day-time temperatures soaring, the cardholders who come to collect their ration are being forced to wait for hours under the scorching sun or return home.
The ration shop owners complained that the faulty EPoS machines are affecting ration distribution. The main complaint, they said, was that they could not connect the machine to the server and this network connectivity issue has affected the biometric authentication of cardholders. The EPoS machines are Aadhaar-based and the rations are distributed after biometric authentication.
Though there is an option of OTP verification of cardholders in case the biometric authentication is not possible, the cardholders rue that quite often they do not get the OTP as a message on their registered mobile phone numbers.
A ration shop dealer from Nedumangad taluk said several dozens of cardholders had to wait for hours in front of his shop hoping that the machine will become functional. “Since most of the cardholders are women, they are the ones who come to buy the ration. On Monday, because of technical issues, EPoS worked intermittently and they had to stand in queue for a prolonged time.
This was not just limited to Monday. The same has been happening for the past six months,” the ration shop dealer said. All-Kerala Retail Ration Dealers’ Association state general secretary T Muhammedali said they had brought the issue to the attention of the officials concerned on many occasions, but they were not listening.
“We want them to do a technical auditing to assess the issue. Because of server issues and other problems, the functioning of ration shops is getting affected.
On top of that, the shop owners are asked to print separate bills for sugar and kerosene, and grains and that adds to their woes. As the issue got escalated, ration shops in the state are operating on two different shifts from November onwards on government instruction. But that has not solved the issue,” he said.
The association has also asked the food and civil supplies department to service the machines, which are more than five years’ old, and replace the faulty ones. Meanwhile, an official of the department said the allegation was not true.