Centre Directs ED, RBI to Act Against Amazon and Flipkart for FDI, FEMA Violations

In a significant development related to war between e-commerce giants and traders of India, the Union Government has directed the Enforcement Directorate and Reserve Bank of India to take necessary action against Amazon and Walmart-owned-Flipkart. The Centre has taken strong cognizance of various complaints made by the Confederation of All India Traders alleging blatant violation of FDI Policy and Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999 by these companies. Bhartia and Secretary General Praveen Khandelwal informed that on several complaints made by the CAIT to Union Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal in the recent past against Amazon & Walmart-owned-Flipkart, the Department of Promotion of Industries and Internal Trade of the Ministry of Commerce in its letter issued on December has asked both Enforcement Directorate and Reserve Bank of India to take necessary action against Amazon and Flipkart. Bhartia and Khandelwal said that in its communication to ED and RBI, the DPIIT has forwarded four complaints of CAIT including violation of FDI policy in deal between Flipkart and Aditya Birla Group, violation of FDI policy related to FDI in manufacturing which is being used for Multi Brand Retailing by various e-commerce companies, violation of FEMA and its rules by Amazon and blatant violation of FEMA and FDI Policy by Amazon and Flipkart and exploitation of loopholes by them. CAIT said that traders across Country will observe Year 2021 as “Bhartiya Vyapaar Samman Varsh” under the aegis of CAIT and all efforts will be made to clean the e-commerce landscape of India and an era of manipulations, mal-practices and exploitation will come to end and the CAIT will promote and encourage traders across Country to adopt digital commerce and digital payments as new instruments to widen the net of business in India.