Draft e-commerce policy contains strong elements of protectionism, say players

Bengaluru, February 25 The draft national e-commerce policy put up for consideration and discussion of all stakeholders by the Department for Promotion of Investments and Internal Trade on Saturday although imperative to the growing e-commerce industry, has strong elements of protectionism in it, say players.

As a consequence, instead of creating a fair marketplace environment to both foreign and domestic e-commerce firms, the Government will end up providing an unfair advantage to local sellers and make it difficult for foreign-controlled e-commerce firms to do business in India.

One of the key issues which the draft policy raises is about data being a national asset and wants foreign companies to localise data in India which will require investments in data infrastructure from e-commerce companies like Amazon and Walmart.