E-commerce policy, consumer protection rules are works in progress: DPIIT secretary

The e-commerce policy for online retailers and the e-commerce rules to protect consumers are works in progress, newly appointed department for promotion of industry and internal trade (DPIIT) secretary Rajesh Kumar Singh said adding that the draft regulations would first be discussed in public before the government would take a final view.

“We are holding discussions to harmonise e-commerce policy and e-commerce rules under the Consumer Protection Act,” he told reporters on Thursday.

Explaining that government will keep the consumer’s interest to the fore while framing the regulations, he said, no final view has been taken on any institutional framework.

The e-commerce policy and e-commerce rules both would be “congruent” with each other, he added.

The two guidelines are awaited for about four years due to the evolving nature of e-tailing business and online commerce.

Also Read: Card tokenisation will the change the way you shop or pay online, and safer too

While the e-commerce policy (aims at regulating online business entities) is being framed by DPIIT in the ministry of commerce and industry; the e-commerce rules (meant to protect online consumers) are being prepared by the department of consumer affairs in the ministry of consumer affairs, food and public distribution. Both ministries are headed by Piyush Goyal.

The government also has to strike a balance between interests of over 80 million ‘kirana’ stores and ‘online giants’ while framing such policies and rules, one government official said. “One of the ways is to provide hassle-free benefit of technology to domestic retailers without any riders, hence the government has recently launched the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC),” he added. According to an industry estimate e-commerce is currently 6% of India’s about $900 billion retail sector and expanding very fast. It is, however, dominated by global majors such as Amazon and Walmart-owned Flipkart.

Last week, domestic retailers – dominated by ‘kirana’ stores – wrote to Goyal urging the government for an early roll-out of e commerce policy and e commerce rules. In a communication to the minister, the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) said they want the guidelines to be in place as they are “facing great harassment at the hands of foreign e-commerce companies and an uneven level playing field because of predatory pricing, exclusivity and owing inventory”.

In a joint letter to the minister, CAIT national president BC Bhartia and secretary general Praveen Khandelwal said: “… since we are not urging for any special favour for the traders but certainly inclined to ensure that laws, rules and regulations and policies of the government must be followed by one and all both in letter & spirit… If the even level playing is not granted, the traders of the country shall be compelled to lose their businesses because of the manipulative and unethical business practices of the e-commerce companies.”

Nilaya Varma, Co-founder and CEO of consultancy firm Primus Partners, said: “The e-commerce rules will be a step in the right direction for the government to streamline the objective of wider and fairer access to marketplaces. The consumers’ interest will have to be prioritized with due consideration of easy and convenient access to logistics, payment options, and a feature of reliability/accountability, all while ensuring that the e-commerce entities continue to innovate in a thriving ecosystem.”

The official mentioned above said the government launched ONDC to help domestic retailers, particularly small businesses and ‘kirana’ stores to take full benefit of e-commerce without any coercion.

Speaking about government’s e-commerce venture on Thursday, DPIIT secretary said ONDC will democratise the sector in the country. On April 24, drawing parallel with government’s fintech revolution through Unified Payments Interface (UPI), commerce minister said, ONDC is also based on a similar concept of interoperable interface. Contrary to any popular e-commerce marketplace operating in India, which is a monolithic business entity, ONDC is designed to become a bouquet of independent platforms giving wider choices to the buyer and providing bigger market to the seller, he said.