US retail group Wal-Mart is poised to make its debut in India next week, opening its first joint-venture wholesale store in a country where modern retail has so far made little headway against traditional traders and small independent shopkeepers.
The opening of the store, which is a joint venture with India's Bharti Enterprises, comes only days after the victory of the Congress party in India's parliamentary election has raised the prospect of further liberalisation of the retail sector, in which foreign direct investment is still restricted to back-end, wholesale operations.
