Traders demand public statement from govt on retail FDI

New Delhi, Feb 11 (UNI) Traders today demanded a public statement by the Centre on issues related to its foreign direct investment (FDI) policy, raised by Congress President Sonia Gandhi.

Ms Sonia Gandhi, in a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh recently, had urged the government to go slow on allowing more FDI in retail. Such decisions should be taken ''only after examining the impact of the decision on livelihood security of those engaged in small-scale operations,'' she had said.

More than five crore retailers across the country are likely to face threat to their existence because of the entry of FDI in retail.

The US retail giant Wal-Mart has tied up with the Bharti group for a retail venture in the country. French major Carrefour and the UK-based Tesco are also planning to enter the Indian retail segment.

According to an estimate, 40 retail giants, like Wal-Mart, Bharti, Reliance and Birlas plan to invest 25 billion dollars into the sector and hope to increase the share of organised retail from the current three per cent to about 15-20 per cent by 2011.

Small retailers will not be able to compete with large monopolistic multinational retailers, such as Wal-Mart and Tesco, and have to opt out of business. This will cause massive unemployment, the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) Secretary General Praveen Khandelwal said.

The confederation demanded immediate cognisance of the issue by the Centre. It also asked the government to formulate a National Trade Policy under which the small retailers can be protected.

The CAIT urged Finance Minister P Chidambaram to give tax exemptions to small retailers in the forthcoming Budget to provide a financial safegauard to them against big players.

UNI