Within days of announcing their $5.7-billion deal, JioMart Platforms reportedly kick-started pilot projects in Navi Mumbai, Thane, and Kalyan, testing its WhatsApp-based online shopping portal. It is still early days for the stated objective of the Facebook-Jio deal: Empower 25-30 million small grocery stores to digitally connect and transact with their customers using Facebook’s WhatsApp application.
Already some trader bodies have raised concerns over sharing the customer data with the Reliance group, which also runs modern retail stores under the Reliance Mart brand. One such body, Federation of All India Vyapar Mandal, issued a statement urging the government to take necessary