The government hopes to be ready in six months with a framework for an e-commerce policy that will address issues such as taxation, competition policy, data localisation, regulatory requirements and technology transfer.

“A task force will be set up to go into ...the inputs received at today’s meeting of the think-tank...Suggestions will continue to come in,” said Commerce Secretary Rita Teaotia, addressing the media on Tuesday, after the first meeting of the think-tank on ‘Framework for National Policy on E-commerce’.

The task force will be headed by the Commerce Secretary and include secretaries and senior officials from other ministries and departments such as IT, telecom and finance. It will submit its findings to the think-tank, which is headed by Commerce Minister Suresh Prabhu.

The e-commerce companies that participated in Tuesday’s meeting raised regulatory issues and the need to have more fine-tuned competition laws to curb predatory practices of big players, an industry participant told BusinessLine .

“There were a lot of concerns raised about large companies such as Amazon, which have big pockets and can give benefits to consumers, which smaller companies cannot,” the participant said.

Oddity in FDI policy?

Discussions also took place on the interpretation of the provision in the FDI policy which barred e-commerce companies from giving discounts and keeping inventories, but which was flouted by many.

“E-commerce players like us do not give discounts, but sellers, who are not related to the company, do,” said Kunal Bahl, CEO, Snapdeal. “But in case there are players giving discounts, we should see how we can implement this (the existing policy, which disallows discounts).”

On whether there would be a regulator for the sector, Teaotia said it would depend on the recommendations of the think-tank.

She said that within the task force, specific groups would be constituted because the subjects are wide ranging from physical infrastructure, technology transfer, competition and FDI to data localisation and the World Trade Organisation.

“The idea (of the policy) is to not to over-regulate but to create a level-playing field,” said Maneck Davar, Vice-Chairman, Services Export Promotion Council.

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