Grofers CEO reveals over 6 lakh carts were waiting to check out in case lockdown was announced by PM Modi

On Tuesday, during Prime Minister Narendra Modi address to the nation, online grocery platform saw a spike in orders being created, anticipating a nationwide lockdown.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the nation late on Tuesday amid the surge in Covid-19 cases. While PM Modi applauded frontline workers during the second wave of Covid-19 infections and urged everyone to follow Covid protocols and not leave their home unless really necessary. PM Modi, during his address, also appealed to the state government to impose lockdowns as a last resort, ending speculations about another nationwide lockdown to be announced during his address to the nation on Tuesday. Grofers CEO and Co-Founder Albinder Dhindsa tweeted during the speech that there were over 6 lakh carts created on the online grocery platform waiting to check out if the PM announced a nationwide lockdown. The spike in carts being created on Grofers can simply be credited to lockdown fears among users. Dhindsa also shared a spike chart screenshot from the company's analytics when orders were being created in the back-end during the PM Modi address to the nation. While Dhindsa didn't reveal how many of these orders were actually placed, the spike is a good enough example of how people feared another nationwide lockdown, similar to what we saw last year. To recall, online grocery platforms like Grofers and Bigbasket saw a big spike in daily orders last year around the same period. One of the possible reasons people were creating orders on Tuesday during PM Modi's speech could be based on their experience during the previous lockdown. Last year, online grocery platforms saw a surge in panic buying which led to essentials being out of stock within hours during the nationwide lockdown.