Anand Mahindra isn't impressed with 10-min delivery, but gives Zepto boss a 'fair' chance to explain his POV

The food aggregators and grocery companies in India are ready to up the thrill game with the controversial 10-minute delivery.

In 2020, start-up Zepto started a 10-minute grocery delivery experiment. Swiggy also extended the same offer with its Instant delivery feature. Soon after, its primary competitor Zomato also joined the brigade, and announced its 10-minute delivery plan as they didn't want to stay far behind.

Despite disclaimers from the companies, the 10-minute delivery feature has attracted a lot of criticism. People have gone ahead to call this move 'inhumane', 'insensitive' and even "10-minute murder".


Sharing his thoughts on the new style of service, Tata Memorial Director Pramesh CS said that 10-minute delivery for groceries was "inhuman to the delivery person."

He said that customers can live with not getting a 10-minute delivery. "I don't care how many trolls I get with this tweet... Just stop it! Customers can live with a 2 or even a 6 hour delivery time," he added.

Anand Mahindra quote-tweeted the post, and wrote, "I agree."


The Mahindra Group Chairman's tweet caught Zepto founder and CEO Aadit Palicha's attention within an hour.

The entrepreneur took some time off his busy schedule to explain how the 10-minute delivery works at the Mumbai-based company.

Palicha said that the quick service was about short distances, and not speed.

In his reply, he wrote, "The average distance of a Zepto delivery is 1.8 km. To travel 1.8 km in 10 minutes, one has to drive at <15 kmph. That’s why Zepto has 3.1x lower accidents on average compared to a regular biker on the road."

The 66-year-old quote-tweeted Palicha's reply, and said, it was "only fair" to hear the founder's point of view.


However, Palicha's explanation didn't impress many. People expressed their concerns over the traffic, bad condition of roads, poor civic rules, time taken to pick-up or deliver products.

Only time will tell if the 10-minute delivery is here to stay or disappear in thin air like Domino's 30-minute pizza delivery scheme.