Keeping up with Competition - January 2024
A monthly newsletter by Axiom5
Welcome to the fourth issue of Keeping up with Competition, our monthly newsletter. We recap the events in the world of Indian competition law and policy in the month of December 2023.
CCI appoints its first permanent Director General of Investigation since the implementation of the Competition (Amendment) Act, 2023
The CCI has appointed Mr. Ansuman Pattnaik as its first permanent Director General of Investigation (DG) since the enactment of the Competition (Amendment) Act, 2023. As reported in last month's update, the CCI had appointed Sanjay Kumar Pandey as Interim DG in place of Dr. Atul Verma, the previous permanent DG. Mr. Pattnaik is an Indian Revenue Services officer of the 1994 batch and has previously served as Additional DG at the CCI.
Stakeholder consultation on draft regulations continue
The CCI published its draft CCI (Determination of Turnover or Income) Regulations, 2023 for stakeholder consultation on 22 December 2023. These regulations, once implemented, will determine the procedural aspects surrounding turnover and income calculations under the penalty provisions of the act.
Merger control - a snapshot
Merger control activity picked up from November, with the CCI approving 11 transactions, 4 of which were under the Green Channel route. The CCI also published 8 detailed orders in December (the summaries of these orders are available here). In comparison to only 7 transactions being notified in November, the CCI received 12 new notices in December. The CCI also invalidated 2 notices, out of which one was re-notified and was approved by the CCI, whereas the other is currently pending the CCI’s review post re-notification.
Behavioural cases
The CCI issued 4 closure orders in November, with the CCI finding that the informant(s) did not present sufficient evidence on record to either raise any competition concerns or substantiate their allegations in 3 orders and in one instance, because the party under investigation was not dominant. More detailed summaries of these orders are available here.
There were no new substantive orders published by the NCLAT or various High Courts last month. However, the Supreme Court did consider and dismiss a review petition filed against its order dismissing an appeal from an NCLAT order. The NCLAT order had upheld the CCI’s decision to dismiss allegations filed by Arrdy Engineering Innovations Private Limited under sections 3 and 4 of the Competition Act, 2002.