OTP Please: Vandana Vasudevan exposes hard truths of the ecommerce economy

From online marketplaces using data to harm local businesses to the suffering that lies behind the glossy growth story that startups tell, Vandana Vasudevan exposes the hard truth of platform economy

OTP Please! Online Buyers, Sellers and Gig Workers in South Asia

By Vandana Vasudevan

Published by Penguin Random House India

384 pages  ₹499

 

It has been almost a year since Piyush Goyal, Union minister of commerce and industry, expressed his concerns about how the ecommerce boom might impact 100 million small retailers across India. While launching a report titled “Assessing the Net Impact of E-Commerce on Employment and Consumer Welfare in India” — published by the Pahle India Foundation —i n August 2024, Mr Goyal said that ecommerce is here to stay “but we have to think very carefully and cautiously about its