CAIT, the traders’ body, demanded on Friday that the government immediately implement a robust e-commerce policy and establish a regulatory authority for the sector.
The Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) reiterated its demands a day after a Parliamentary panel suggested digital market entities to desist from “anti-steering”, “deep discounting”, “self preferencing”, “search & ranking preferencing” and other practices that will impact competition in the market.
A Parliamentary panel proposed an ex-ante regulation, classification of “systemically important digital intermediaries” based on revenue, market capitalisation, and number of users, and a new digital competition law on Thursday to combat anti-competitive practises in digital markets.
The recommendations are part of the Standing Committee on Finance’s report on ‘Anti-Competitive Practices by Big Tech Companies,’ which was tabled in Parliament on Thursday, and come amid growing concerns about unfair business practises in digital markets.
Praveen Khandelwal, Secretary General of the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT), told PTI that a regulatory authority, similar to Sebi and the RBI, is required to regulate e-commerce trade in India.
“Government should release e-commerce rules under Consumer Protection Act, issue a new press note in place of press note 2 of 2018 of FDI Retail Policy,” Khandelwal said.