Niit To Draft J Thomas Auction Plan

J Thomas & Co, world's oldest tea broking firm, has roped in NIIT Ltd to prepare a detailed blueprint for its proposed online tea auctioning programme which is slated to be ready in the next 90 days.

P K Sen, chairman and managing director, J Thomas & Co, said: "We are putting special emphasis on quality and we first propose to induct only a select group of known and trusted buyers into the online auction business. Online auctions for us will initially be a limited business."

According to Sen, J Thomas was awaiting the guidelines on e-commerce to be laid down by the Union government as well as the Reserve Bank of India before embarking on full steam on online tea auctioning.

 

"We are treading on this field cautiously, unlike others, as there are many loopholes which need to be explained and clarified. We will enlarge our clientele once all the e-commerce laws are firmly in place," he continued.

J Thomas is the second instance of an organisation conducting tea auction through the Net in the country. In March, Teauction.com, a dotcom firm, kicked off tea auction online, in which tea majors such as Williamson Magor and Aft Industries of the Apeejay Surrendra group hold equity stakes. Teauction.com is in the process of finalising forward and futures trading in tea.

The honour for the first tea deal through the Internet-based online auction went to Hapjan Bop belonging to the Apeejay group of industries.

A portal for tea auction normally plans to bring together the entire community of buyers, sellers, registered brokers, suppliers and associations to a single platform. At present, only 55 per cent of India's tea is sold through auction despite 75 per cent legislation.