With the closure of the Blinkit dark store in Balewadi, around 40 delivery partners who worked from this location have been distributed to nearby Blinkit stores in Sus Gaon, Pashan’s Balaji chowk, Nanaware chowk, and a store near Pancard club in Baner.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in Pune ordered the immediate closure of a Blinkit dark store near Mitcon College after finding violations during an inspection on June 5.
Suresh Annapure, Joint Commissioner of FDA Pune, revealed that Energy Darkstore Services, which operates as a Blinkit franchise, was found running without a valid license, and the facility had multiple compliance issues.
Unlike traditional retail stores, dark stores have no customer-facing operations. These facilities focus entirely on storage, sorting, packaging, and dispatching products ordered through mobile apps.
Delivery partners, on condition of anonymity, shared their struggles with the sudden closure.
One of the delivery partners, who has been working for Blinkit for over four years, said, “Earlier, we used to complete over 40 orders per day from the Balewadi store. Now that we have been moved to unfamiliar areas, we struggle to find delivery addresses quickly. This leads to delays, and customers often cancel their orders.”
“While driving faster to meet delivery times, especially during the monsoon season, increases the risk of vehicle slipping and accidents,” another affected delivery executive said.
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“If we don’t meet our daily earning targets, our entire month’s budget gets disrupted. Many of us have home loan EMIs to pay, and such disturbances are troublesome,” one of the affected delivery executives said.
The redistribution has also created workplace conflicts. Existing delivery partners at the Blinkit store near the Pan Card Club in Baner reportedly called a strike to prevent the new transfers from working in their area.
“Due to this resistance, we can now only manage about 20 deliveries per day, compared to our earlier 35 to 40 orders,” a delivery executive said, adding “We are hoping the license issues get resolved quickly so we can return to our normal routine.”
Moreover, the closure has also affected customer service in the area.
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Snehal Tripathi, an IT professional living in Baner, said, “I was surprised that deliveries continued even after hearing about the store closure. But the delivery time has increased from the usual 8 minutes to 15 minutes today.”
Nilesh Desai, a mechanical engineer from the same area, said, “We’ve become so dependent on these quick delivery apps that even a small disruption affects our daily routine. After the closure news, I realised that I have not visited the physical grocery stores in the past six months.
While convenience is great, such situations make us think about having alternate options.”
The store managers did not respond to calls for comments.
