Government e Marketplace (GeM), an online platform for procurement of goods and services for Central and State government organisations, has indicated that small enterprises that have difficulties in onboarding the platform could approach Common Service Centres or Post Offices soon for free registrations.

“We have 50 lakh sellers on the GeM platform of which eight lakh are MSEs (micro and small enterprises). A lot of small units are not able to understand the slightly complex onboarding procedures on the portal. So, we have tied with the common service centres (CSCs) and India Posts to help small units,” Prashant Kumar Singh, CEO, GeM, said at the CII Southern Region MSME Procurement Summit.

CSC alone has about five lakh touch points across the country and there are 1.5 lakh post offices.

Three pillars of support

Singh explained that GeM is based on three pillars – transparency, efficiency and inclusivity. “Well, a digital portal can give you transparency and efficiency, but what is more important is inclusivity as the Prime Minister’s call to GeM is to reach out to the last mile in the queue. The smallest of the entrepreneurs should be in a position to transact with the biggest of the players available in the market. This is the ecosystem we are trying to create. We are still far from being ready for that, but every step we take is in that direction,” he added.

He also pointed out that MSMEs in progressive states like Tamil Nadu and Karnataka could onboard into the GeM portal instead of restricting themselves to State-centric portals as there will be immense opportunities for them to grow.

Some States like Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra and Delhi, among others are procuring in a big way through the GeM portal, but a lot of States are still staying from GeM.

Since GeM claims itself as contemporary in technology and much more advanced, the features provided on it may not be available on the State portals.

“Perhaps, the State portals’ visibility may be less. We studied the systems of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. They are confined to the State boundaries. For example, MSEs in Tamil Nadu have received orders worth ₹32,060 crore from entities outside the State, whereas the government departments in Tamil Nadu have given them orders of just ₹230 crore. So this is the advantage GeM provides. The MSEs of TN, which are efficient, are supplying in a big way to the outside world,” said Singh.

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