Vikram Aditya
Port Blair, Nov 13: A laptop, which is available with the distributor in Mainland at the rate of Rs. 30,000, when reaches Andaman costs more than Rs. 33,000 for the shop owner due to several taxes and also 6 percent Octroi of PBMC at Port Blair port. The shop owners keep a margin of minimum Rs. 1000 and sell the laptop at Rs. 34,000.
Surprisingly same laptops are also available in online marketing sites at Rs. 30,000 or less. Often discount coupons and several offers make the laptop cheaper for an online buyer and hence instead of going for local shops computer savvy customers will prefer to buy the laptop online and save money.
Same is the situation with other goods right from shoes, mobiles, TV etc everything is cheaper online.
If one person spends Rs. 2000 for online purchasing in a month and if we consider that 1000 people buy products online then in a month Rs. 20,00,000 (20 lakh) is going outside Andaman. Practically much more money from Andaman is going out every month.
The money which should have otherwise remained in Islands is now going away, which is weakening Andaman Economy.
No one can stop local buyers from purchasing goods online because it is the right of customers to buy things from any seller they prefer.
Many believe that the only way to deal with this problem is to abolish the Octroi. If Octroi is abolished it would make huge difference and local shop owners will be able to compete with online sellers as they will have advantage of selling things hand to hand and that deliver goods on the same day.
In that way all this money will remain in Andaman and rotate in local market. When money will rotate in local market, everyone will get some share and when more people with spend money Andaman economy will automatically become strong. Remember the golden rule, which says that best way to revive economy is to go out and spend money.
