The Department for Promotion of Industry & Internal Trade (DPIIT) along with small retailers group Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) are setting up an e-commerce platform to help the local kirana stores take orders online for essentials and provide last mile contactless delivery.
In a media release by CAIT, it said apart from DPIIT and CAIT, the other promoters for this marketplace are Startup India, Invest India, All India Consumer Products Distributors Federation and Avana Capital. It said the e-commerce portal will onboard about seven crore traders of the country.
“Manufacturers, distributors, wholesalers, retailers of all verticals of domestic trade and consumers will be the integral part of this e-commerce platform,” it said.
“With the current crisis, the population in the Tier 2 and 3 cities of India that were highly dependent on these kirana stores for their daily supplies are now facing challenges and to overcome this situation, the national e-commerce market place has been perceived by both DPIIT and CAIT not restricted to present crisis but a permanent e commerce platform for digitalising existing business of entire trading community of India,” the release said.
The e commerce portal will be eventually enlarged to all items.
CAIT secretary general Praveen Khandelwal said that the e-commerce national marketplace has already been conceived and designed and has played a crucial role in ensuring supply of essential goods in different cities under present Covid-19 crisis.
He said that the e-commerce marketplace will be of the traders, by the traders and for the traders and consumers of the country.
Khandelwal said that it is one of the concrete initiative further to accomplish the vision of digital India and digital payments of Prime Minister Narendra Modi through which the traditional retailers of the Country will be aligned with e-commerce and digital payments.
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