CAIT demand Piyush Goyal for action against unfair practices of Big Tech companies

Central Chronicle News
Raipur, Sep 05: CAIT National Vice President Amar Parwani, chairman Mangelal Maloo, Amar Gidwani, State President, Jitendra Doshi, States Working President, Vikram Singh Deo, Parmanand Jain, Vashu Makhija, State General Secretary Suriender Singh, State Working General Secretary Bharat Jain, State Treasurer Ajay Agrawal and state media incharge Sanjay Choubey informed that The Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) in a communication sent to Union Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal on Saturday urged him to take immediate action against big app store operators from forcing software developers to use their platform’s payment systems in consideration of huge commissions. Recently, South Korea has passed a legislation imposing a ban on big app stores. Prominently two major Companies Google and Apple are charging the use of their payment systems commissions of up to 30% and forcing the users of their software to use their payment system only which is a non-competitive practice and limit the choice to a greater extent of the users. Over the period big tech companies have gained enormous clout which has proved a major roadblock for large number of small technology players and therefore there is a need for regulatory steps in order to protect users and preventing corporate abuse of powers-added CAIT.
Raising this demand, the CAIT National Vice President Mr. Amar Parwani & State President Mr. Jitendra Doshi said that like other mal-practices being done in e-commerce, the same practices are being tried to enforce in technology also which is not in the larger interest of the country. There is an emergent need of bringing openness in technology sector also giving equal opportunities to all service providers to provide best material and services and let the consumer decides what to use and what not. They further said that the Government should hold app store gatekeepers accountable for their harmful and anti-competitive practices. Both the leaders hoped that the Government will follow South Korea’s lead and will ensure to level the playing field for all app developers and users.
Mr. Parwani & Mr. Doshi said that at the end of the last month Apple made changes to the way its APP Store operators as part of a $ 100 million settlement with US based app developers who sued the Company for using unfair practices.
They impress upon the Government to protect competition and strengthen consumer protections within the app market as part of a push to curb the power of big tech companies like e-commerce. It is regretted that dominance and making market monopolistic becomes the core agenda of global companies as they do not believe in fundamentals of co-existence.