Commerce minister Piyush Goyal on Tuesday said that Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) will provide a much larger market for sellers without any preferred or priority sellers, ensuring equitable and fair treatment for all stakeholders and highlighted that ONDC will foster economies of scale, competition and better pricing along with quality that will ultimately benefit consumers.

While attending an event ‘Enabling Bharat 2.0’, the minister invited all e-commerce players to join the government-backed ONDC. The minister further pointed out that the government doesn’t want private companies to piggyback on the ONDC platform to offer their products.

A few weeks before, PhonePe has reportedly launched a hyperlocal commerce app ‘Pincode’ which is built on the ONDC platform. As per sources, a few more companies are on their way to launch their own app on top of ONDC. On the backdrop of these developments, Goyal said that, “A few days ago, there was a company that had created an ONDC specific platform. That’s exactly what we don’t want to happen.” The minister also advised ONDC CEO T Koshy to stop anybody that says, “We have built a special platform for ONDC.”

Moreover, Goyal has asserted that companies should register their main platforms on Open Network For Digital Commerce (ONDC) and allow customers to access other products on the network instead of building a separate app. He also suggested that ONDC CEO should remove any company that has partially registered with the network.

“We need to identify and approach companies that have a large retail network and onboard them on the network through the company’s platform or other smaller platforms and offer their various outputs,” said Goyal.

Enabling Bharat 2.0 is a one-day workshop conducted by ONDC in association with DPIIT, ministry of commerce and government of India to enlighten attendees on the vast potential of open network initiatives, and how these technologies can revolutionize digital commerce in India.

“ONDC offers a unique proposition to empower all kinds of stakeholders to become a part of the digital revolution and reap uncapped benefits from it. The workshop sets up the right stage to revisit what we have achieved so far, and set the ideal tone for the future through holistic collaboration, driving strategies for inclusion, empowerment and economic growth,” said T Koshy.

Incorporated in 2021, ONDC is an initiative of the Department of Promotion Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), Ministry of Commerce and Government of India envisioned to create a facilitative model to revolutionize digital commerce giving a greater thrust to penetration of retail e-commerce in India.