Inter-ministerial collaboration can reap immense benefits
As the Indian government seeks to promote the use and adoption of technology across sectors, it must first adopt a whole-of-government approach, said Ambika Khanna, Senior Researcher, International Law Studies Programme, Gateway House.
“This is important especially as the issues in the technology sector including data, privacy, investments and anti-trust are all inter-linked and impossible to segregate,” she said in a paper “Big, bigger tech: trust and anti-trust” which was published on Gateway House website on 18 Mar 2021.
The technology sector will benefit immensely if the policy makers across ministries align and expedite policy-making – from Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology on data protection (personal and non-personal data) and AI, to Ministry of Commerce and Industry on e-commerce and FDI, to Ministry of Home Affairs on national security concerns, to the Competition Commission of India on anti-trust and merger control.
“This inter-ministerial collaboration can reap immense socio-economic benefits for the Indian economy, resulting in policies that reflect the New India,” said Khanna.
The government is trying to update its regulation to deal with fast-moving Big Tech.
In order to control unfettered investments in India, and to curb monopolisation in the e-commerce sector in particular, the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade introduced amendments to the Foreign Direct Investment Policy in 2018, she wrote in the paper.
This imposed embargoes on product exclusivity and prohibited inventory-based models for foreign e-commerce players. Of course Flipkart and Amazon protested – but they did have to change their business models to align with the new regulations.
“In spite of such policy measures, companies continue to hold dominant market positions,” said Khanna. #investment #regulations #policies #economy /fiinews.com
