Pune: To overcome the challenge of providing essential goods to citizens during the lockdown, the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) and the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) will ensure contactless delivery and will soon launch a national e-commerce marketplace by connecting local grocery (Kirana) stores, said a press release by CAIT.
DPIIT and CAIT are synergising the efforts of various companies and start-ups working in the supply chain to help Kirana stores take orders online and ensure last-mile contactless delivery through a national e-commerce marketplace.
The release stated that besides DPIIT & CAIT, other promotors are Startup India, Invest India, All India Consumer Products Distributors Federation and Avana Capital. This vast purely Indian e-commerce portal will make all efforts to onboard approximately seven crore traders of the country.
With the current COVID-19 crisis, the population in Tier 2 and 3 cities that were highly dependent on grocery stores for their daily supplies, are now facing challenges.
The national e-commerce market place has been perceived by DPIIT and CAIT. It is not restricted to present crisis but a permanent e-commerce platform for digitalising existing business of the entire trading community.
Startup India under DPIIT on its portal has invited applications from start-ups and aspiring entrepreneurs having a fitting technology-enabled solution to any of about 54 verticals at present.
CAIT National President BC Bhartia and Secretary General Praveen Khandelwal said that the marketplace has already been conceived and designed and has played a crucial role in ensuring the supply of essential goods in different cities under present COVID-19 crisis. They said the e-commerce marketplace would be of the traders, by the traders and for the traders and consumers of the country.
E-commerce platforms have seen manifold growth in orders on their platforms in India over the past few weeks as people logged online to stock food and household items as well as office items such as routers and cables (for work from home) on concerns around the spread of COVID-19 and restrictions in public movement that have now been enforced.
(inputs from agencies)
