With a strong mandate to oppose global e commerce companies for their violative actions & business policies, acts of several Chinese companies to invade India’s retail trade through technology in absence of any data security law and complication of GST tax structure, more than 100 top trade leaders of all States will have head hunt sessions on forthcoming 23-24 February at New Delhi at a two days National Traders Conference convened by the Confederation of All India Traders ( CAIT). The conference will be inaugurated by Union Minister Smt Smriti Irani who will be delivering a key note address laying greater emphasis on greater adoption & acceptance of Atmnirbhar Bharat, vocal on local and Digital India vision of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi- informed CAIT. The two days conference is all set to declare launching of a national movement on traders issues among 8 crore traders of the Country through participation of more than 40 thousand trade associations.
CAIT National President Mr B C Bhartia & Secretary General Mr Praveen Khandelwal said the current scenario of e-commerce suffered with various mal-practices and complications of GST have challenged the very existence of retail trade India and giving much pain to the traders. The failure of Governments in the Country to address these crucial issues have generated much anguish & resentment among the business community across the Country and has compelled the CAIT for launching an aggressive national campaign. Since Central Government is a merely a policy making body, the larger focus of the campaign will be on State Governments as trade is a State subject and State Governments are implementing Authority. The campaign will also attacking the political discourse of the Country because so far the political parties have kept a total silence on these two issues.
Spelling out the agenda of the meeting, Mr Bhartia & Mr Khandelwal said that top 100 trade leaders of the Country will have extensive deliberations and will understand the amendment made in GST Act and Income Tax Act by Union Budget 2022, Complications of GST, adverse impact of current e-commerce trade on offline traders having illgal and unethical way of doing business by foreign e-commerce companies at the core, failure of Mudra scheme reaching out to traders,Consideration of issues and concerns emerged out of rules framed by Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) particularly for Jewelary & Footwear trade, issues and concerns under Food Safety and Standard Act.
Several other issues will be discussed at length including demand to create a separate tax slab under Income Tax for traders, need of a National Retail Policy and an E commerce Policy with an affective Regulatory Authority, Replacement of all sorts of trade licenses with only one license, abrogation of outdated laws concerning trade, support policies of the Government for access to finances to traders on reduced rate of interest, empowerment of women entrepreneurs, hand holding of start ups, effective pension & insurance scheme for traders, upgradation and modernisation of existing format of retail trade.
