The onset of information and communication technology has changed the way of buying and selling products and services all over the world and India is also not lagging far behind. As a result the dynamics of the gigantic and vibrant Indian Retail Market is also transforming at a phenomenal pace. Technology is fast changing the traditional way of retailing from physical brick and mortar retailing stores to technology enabled online retail stores. Customers especially the generation next (age group 18-36 yrs.) are swiftly adopting the online channels for a variety of products ranging from consumer durables to apparel and accessories to day to day groceries.

This paper discusses the key enablers of the online retailing in India along with the challenges and the way ahead. The important technology enablers or the factors contributing the success of online retailing are deep internet penetration, innovative payment options, increased confidence in online transactions, use of smart phones for browsing internet and shopping. The key demographic enablers are the rising salaries of youths with more disposable incomes, nuclear families all leading to change in consumption pattern. Another key facet of online retailing is the challenges the industry is facing not only from the competition but also from the facts of low conversion rate, increasing cancellation and returns, slow internet connections and price shopping. The study tries to discuss the way ahead for the industry in the light of key enablers and the challenges. The study is based on the content analysis of the secondary data involving different research articles, reports and documents of private and government research agencies. The methodology thus includes the qualitative analysis of the available literature to extract the findings and drawing conclusions.

The reason for undertaking this study is very much obvious. Today online retailing or e-tailing is very pervasive and growing thick and fast. So much so, today it has started to threaten the traditional brick-and-mortar retail that many physical retailers have started to establish or beef up their online presence. If not all pervasive it is going to give quite a competition to traditional retailing. It is going to be a giant phenomenon in coming years. Thus in current scenario it becomes imperative to study the existing state of affairs in online retailing industry so that sufficient information is present for industry and researchers related to the key enablers or factors responsible for the success of online retail channels, the challenges faced by them and the way ahead for sustenance.

The study is organised into the following sections i.e. the introduction, objectives, methodology, discussions/findings and conclusions.