There has been an announcement by Bihar Government not to allow walmart-Bharti stores in Bihar, as it will impact the lives of million vegetable and fruit vendors. Well, on the face of it, the logic for not allowing setting up stores looks quite pragmatic and populist. But I am not sure, as I personally feel that competition should not be excluded keeping in view populist measures and sentiments in mind. There should be a due diligence on how these stores will truly impact the vendors and not complement it.
The nitish government should not just go by logic of things, which superficially looks quite sensible. May be these stores would lead to a great demand for vegetable and fruits, which naturally due to reasons of logistics, be outsourced from Bihar only. The farmers will get a good price for it, and in turn get integrated to a larger economy. Or maybe the mom-pop stores, roadside vendors and large retail stores can co-exist in peace, as we see it in Delhi and NCR.
One never knows, but I feel that Bihar government should give a signal to larger private players that it is open to change and encourages healthy capitalist investments, as this state has no real large private players truly investing in Bihar, apart from telecom players, which by its very nature of service is unavoidable.
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