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| Centre bans e-commerce operations during lockdown | | | Jammu: A day before its guidelines on phase two of the COVID-19 lockdown come into effect, the Centre has banned the operation of all e-commerce companies, including the supply of essential items.
In its April 15 guidelines, the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) had said that e-commerce companies would be exempted and their delivery vehicles would be allowed to ply with valid passes.
In a fresh order signed by Union Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla on Sunday, the MHA has said: “In continuation of Ministry of Home Affairs’ Order No. 40-3/2020-DM-|(A) Dated 15th April, 2020 and 16th April, 2020 and in exercise of the powers conferred under Section 10(2)(l) of the Disaster Management Act, the undersigned, in his capacity as Chairperson, National Executive Committee, hereby orders to exclude” from its consolidated guidelines a Sub-Clause which allowed operation of “E-commerce companies” and said that “vehicles used by e commerce operators will be allowed to ply with necessary permissions”.
While the new order makes no distinction on essential and non-essential items, it appears to suggest that the entire e-commerce operations would be suspended. However, the MHA spokesperson only tweeted saying that e-commerce platforms would not be allowed to deal in non-essential items. (Here’s what’s allowed and what’s not)
The MHA said the new order has been issued “for strict implementation by Ministries/ Departments of Government of India, State/Union Territory Governments and State/ Union Territory Authorities”.
The move is likely to come as a jolt to e-commerce companies which had begun preparing to resume full-scale operation and hoped this would help revive the retail economy.
Sources said the development is a result of pressure put by various traders’ groups, including the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT). It had on April 18 written to the government that at a time when local traders were not allowed to deal in non-essential items, allowing e-commerce platforms to do so would create trade imbalance and that the trading community was very disappointed with the government decision to give e commerce companies a free run.
In the first set of lockdown guidelines announced on March 24, “telecommunications, internet services, broadcasting and cable services, IT and IT-enabled services only (for essential services) and as far as possible to work from home” was allowed. Also, “delivery of all essential goods” was allowed. After these first guidelines were announced, numerous online delivery staff were assaulted and stopped from traveling. After the lockdown was announced Flipkart suspended its operations temporarily. Amazon India had stopped taking orders and disabled shipment of low delivery products
The lockdown was first announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on March 24 for 21 days in a bid to combat the coronavirus endemic. While extending the lockdown till May 3, the Prime Minister also declared that select necessary activities will be allowed to be opened up from April 20 in identified areas of the country.
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