Amid the festivals and the ecommerce players plans to go big on the sale by giving lucrative discounts to customers, there is a news which could potentially be a risk for the team.
Praveen Khandelwal Urges Ban on E-commerce Sales Events
On Sunday, BJP MP Praveen Khandelwal had urged Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal to suspend the upcoming “festival sales” events of leading e-commerce players which includes the likes of Amazon and Flipkart, under the premise that these events harm domestic traders.
When it comes to mom-and-pop stores of the world, Asia Pacific leads the space and in turn there are countries like India and China. These stores are called as “kiranas” in India and it is believed that there are over 13 million such shops in the “country of shopkeepers”.
In the interest of small retailers of the country, the MP has asked to roll out the e-commerce rules and policy.
Alleged Anti-Competitive Practices, Collusion & Preferential Treatment
Khandelwal, who is the Lok Sabha member from Chandni Chowk and Secretary General Emeritus of Confederation of All India Traders ( CAIT) said that as per a Competition Commission of India(CCI) report, big brands have been found colluding with the online retailers in breach of anti-trust laws.
In the light of such reporting, he has “urged suspension of upcoming ‘festival sales’ events of Amazon and Flipkart, as they will further harm domestic traders through the continued use of anti-competitive practices”.
MP, while citing the media reports about CCI, said that an uneven playing field had been created for domestic players. He said that “E-commerce giants promote preferential treatment and collusion. These platforms engage in preferential listings and exclusive partnerships with specific sellers and brands, leading to an unfair market environment,” he said.
Touching down on the topic of preferential treatment, he said that “instead of acting as neutral platforms, ‘both Flipkart and Amazon’ favored select sellers, and disadvantaged the vast majority of sellers”.
