Hilsa on a click: Bengal's fish market goes online, starts home delivery

The traditional fish market is shifting to digital space with online order of fish and doorstep delivery slowly becoming the norm in the city.

Besides the West Bengal government's 'Smartfish' app for online shopping of fish, six engineering students from different premier institutions have launched an online retail shop where one can get fresh fish and meat along with groceries and some other food stuff.

"We can provide you 75-80 types of fish and different varieties of chicken and mutton. The only thing you need to do is to place your order by 9 PM the day before and your order will be delivered the next day within two hours of procurement from the market," founder of 'Delybazar' Abhirup Basak said.

'Delybazar' has around 22,000 registered customers with an annual turnover close to Rs 40 million. It can be availed through website and app both.

"Even as there are some other online national grocery stores, the utmost USP of 'Delybazar' is you get fresh, unprocessed and unpreserved fish and meat from here like nowhere else," Basu claimed.

The West Bengal government's 'Smartfish' app to book fish online was launched earlier this year by the State Fisheries Development Corporation.

Using the app, one can get fish delivered at doorstep in any form fillet, dressed, dry or pickle.

SFDC Director Soumyajit Das had said after the app was launched in January, that 22 varieties of fish, seven categories of dried fish and fish pickle would be sold through this app.

"This is the first time a government organisation has launched a fish app to sell varieties of fish. The fish will be delivered directly once the consumer makes the choice," he said.

In a trial run of the app, SFDC sold fish in several parts of north eastern part of Kolkata including pockets of satellite township Salt Lake.