THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The newly developed BevQ mobile application for introducing virtual queue system for liquor sale in Kerala is not ready for launch yet though it has been nearly a week since Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan announced that the state is ready to open its liquor vends.
Fair Code, the Kochi-based startup which developed the app, has been told to improve its security aspects, officials said.
The Kerala State Beverages Corporation (Bevco) had entrusted the app’s security audit test with a private agency in Thiruvananthapuram which is yet to give its report.
Bevco MD Sparjan Kumar told TNIE that the corporation is ready to launch the app anytime once the security clearance is issued.
“Along with the customers, we too have been waiting to get the clearance for the past few days,” he said. Bevco sources said the corporation is not in a position to announce a date for restarting liquor sale. There are various stages in the security audit test which have to be cleared. Only then the app’s commercial launch will be possible.
Otherwise, the corporation could be drawn into litigation if anything goes wrong. The agency was not happy with the load test done on the app and it asked the startup to enhance the app’s technical competency.
“Normally, a customer will try to take an online token from at least two or three smartphones, thus increasing the traffic. This is what was seen in Tamil Nadu and Delhi when the apps for virtual queue system were launched, which led to a crash. We have to avoid this scenario in Kerala where the traffic would be 10 times more. The app failed to meet this expectation and the startup was told to rework. Further, Kerala has also plans to make it a permanent mechanism,” said a senior officer.