CAIT seeks Prabhu's intervention in Flipkart-Walmart deal

Traders' body CAIT today said it seeks Commerce & Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu's intervention in the proposed USD 12-billion Flipkart-Walmart deal, saying the alliance will ?encourage? malpractices and predatory pricing in e-commerce.

In a letter to Prabhu, Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) said the sale of Flipkart's? Singapore holding company should not be allowed ?till the time the government frames an e-commerce policy.

The traders' body argued that the government should make it mandatory that such deals can take place only when 75 per cent of the sellers on an e-platform give their assent since they would be the worst sufferers.

"In order to ensure free and fair e-commerce business in the country, we suggest that a policy for e-commerce should be finalised at an early date in consultation with all stakeholders including the trading community," CAIT said.

Moreover, it claimed that such a deal will ?encourage malpractices, loss funding and predatory pricing in e-commerce? in the absence of any monitoring mechanism and create an uneven level playing field where offline and online traders will be unable to compete.