National Restaurant Association of India (NRAI) has said it will approach the Competition Commission of India (CCI) over “anti-competitive” practices of food delivery apps Zomato and Swiggy.
In an interview with Press Trust of India (PTI), NRAI president Sagar Daryani raised concern over the food delivery apps engaging in “private labelling”, “data masking” and “deep discounting”.
Daryani has alleged private labelling on the part of the delivery apps through new quick food delivery apps like Bistro and Snacc and that procuring food from third-party kitchens instead of restaurant partners is negatively impacting the restaurant business.
Restaurant owners also express concern over Zomato and Swiggy leveraging data on customers’ order preferences and launching their own brands catering to those preferences and marketing them alongside or in competition with their partner restaurants.
In response to this Zomato CEO Deepinder Goyal, wrote to partner restaurants and assured them that their apps will not create an uneven playing field for the restaurant industry. “The Bistro team has no access to data that would create an unfair playing field. In fact, all Zomato data and insights are available to all restaurant partners and the public through Zomato Trends,” CEO Goyal wrote in an email to the restaurant partners, reported Upstox.
Showing support to NRAI’s legal action against quick delivery apps the Indian Federation of App-Based Transport Workers (IFAT) has also called for prioritizing the delivery partner’s well-being which is endangered by the promises of a 10-minute delivery.
“This reckless pursuit of ultra-fast delivery timelines not only endangers the lives of delivery workers but also creates unsustainable pressure on them to meet unrealistic expectations. The implications of this model extend far beyond the exploitation of gig and Platform workers—it threatens road safety, violates labor rights, and prioritizes profit over human well-being.” said National General Secretary of IFAT, Shaik Salauddin, in a press release.
IFAT has condemned the 10-minute deliveries saying it compels the drivers to compromise road safety and personal well being and have said that the lack of fair wages, job security, and social protection for gig and Platform workers in such high-pressure environments is unacceptable. They have also raised ethical concerns over the alleged misuse of data for operational efficiency at the cost of worker privacy.
The new allegations faced by the delivery apps are an addition to the existing petition filed by NRAI to CCI in 2021 over Zomato and Swiggy abusing their dominant market positions.
NRAI has also suggested restaurants looking at alternatives like Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) which is a decentralised open e-commerce model backed by the government of India and already partnered with companies like OLA and Paytm.
