Ranchi Mar 27 PTI The Jharkhand governments flagship Grain ATM project that aims at modernising the public distribution system has failed to attract more than one bidder even after completion of the second deadline on March 23 an official said on SundayThe government is now contemplating extending the last date for submitting the expression of interest by a week or so he saidThe food and public distribution department had planned to set up Grain ATMs at 10 locations across the state to check leakages in the supply chainThe primary focus was to install these multi-commodity automated machines at high-volume fair price shops and state food corporation godowns in populated areas by June this year the official saidThe department also planned to set up Grain ATMs at more than 2600 fair price shops in the state he saidIt had accordingly floated an expression of interest EoI for the project in February and extended the deadline for submitting bids till March 23Till now only one bidder has shown interest in the project To finalise it we need at least two biddersWe are now planning to go for another extension of the last date by a week or so to invite more bidders Food public distribution and consumer affairs director Dilip Tirkey told PTIA Ranchi-based bidder has so far shown interest in the project he said The Grain ATMs will mainly be established at fair price shops and they will be linked to e-PoS point of sale machines There will be a biometric authentication system in the unit The benefit of the initiative is that PDS dealers cannot provide lesser amounts of foodgrains to beneficiaries Once a PDS dealer pushes the button of kg it will automatically come to the departments record and a beneficiary will get food items another official saidThe move is to check irregularities in the supply of ration as beneficiaries of the public distribution system often lodge complaints against PDS dealers for malpracticesThe department had suspended more than 100 PDS dealers on basis of such complaints in 2020 the official saidAround 228 crore beneficiaries who are registered under the priority household category of the food security scheme in Jharkhand get 5 kg of grains a month at Re 1 per kg while 9 lakh BPL households enrolled under the Antyodaya Anna Yojana programme are entitled to 35 kg of grains per month at Re 1 per kgHarayana is stated to be Indias first state to set up a Grain ATM - Annapurti- in Gurugram in July 2021 This machine can dispense up to 70 kg of grains within five to seven minutes PTI SAN NAM BDC BDC