India’s aim to tighten e-com rules faces internal gov’t dissent
Al Jazeera
A handful of ministries, including the finance ministry, have raised concerns about the proposed rules calling them ‘excessive’.
India’s plan to tighten rules on its fast-growing e-commerce market has run into internal government dissent, memos reviewed by Reuters news agency show, with the Ministry of Finance describing some proposals as “excessive” and “without economic rationale”.
The memos offer a rare glimpse of high-stakes policy-making governing a market already featuring global retail heavyweights from Amazon to Walmart, plus domestic players like Reliance Industries and Tata Group. The sector is forecast by Grant Thornton to be worth $188bn by 2025.
It is not clear how the objections from the finance ministry – a dozen in total – will ultimately be reflected in the proposed rule changes, first floated in June. But watchers of the influential government arm say its complaints will not fall on deaf ears in the upper echelons of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration.
