Bhubaneswar: The state government in 2013 came up with an initiative to provide fresh vegetables to the people at lower-than-market price through its Udyan Fresh outlets opened in collaboration of a private agency and the agriculture department.

Accordingly, 14 outlets were opened in Bhubaneswar and two more in Cuttack in the first phase. The initiative aimed at providing fresh, direct-from-the-farm vegetables to the people even during crisis situations such as inflation and natural disasters.

However, many of these outlets in the city now remain closed. Few others, which continue to run, sell items other than vegetables.

Sources said these outlets fail to stock enough vegetables and this has led to less people visiting the facilities.

"Initially, the outlets stocked enough fresh vegetables. But they gradually began getting out of stock frequently. I used to visit the outlet daily earlier to buy fresh vegetables. But with them not having enough stock later, I had to go to other places," said Laxmidhar Nayak, a resident of Nayapalli.

A visit by The Telegraph on Tuesday to a few of these outlets revealed a different story.

The first outlet, at Unit II Market, was not only closed but also in a dilapidated condition with a multi-storey car parking project coming up near it.

The second outlet at Nayapalli - the one Laxmidhar Nayak visited earlier - has remained closed for the past fortnight.

"This store has remained locked for the past 15 days and even if it was open, it didn't get customers because enough vegetables were never stocked. The outlets never served their purpose," said Niraj Jena, who sells tea near the outlet.

Minaketan Parija, who runs a shop at Unit II Market, said the Udyan Fresh was a failure concept and the government was not taking enough steps to make it sustainable.

"The outlet here started selling terracotta pots since it could not attract enough customers buying vegetables. It is now closed," said Pariaja.

Agriculture department insiders said the lack of availability of fresh vegetables and their higher-than-market prices led to the sale of vegetables at these outlets going down.

"This has resulted in a low customer footfall and leading to closure of many of these outlets," said an official of the department.

Only four of the 14 Udyan Fresh outlets in Bhubaneswar now function. Neither of the two in Cuttack operate at this point.

A senior official of the agriculture department said they were making plans to revive the outlets and make them more customer-friendly.

"We will co-ordinate with the private agency and take concrete steps to revive the outlets," said the official who did not want to be named.