Settlement rules will help: CCI

Kaur, who was appointed to her post in May, said that rolling out the commitment and settlement processes and the so-called leniency plus regime outlined in this year’s Competition Amendment Act, 2023, will significantly aid the ease of doing business in the country.

Businesses and other parties can apply for settlements before the regulator issues its final order after an investigation, while commitments to address regulatory concerns around anti-competitive behaviour has to be made prior to the final order. The leniency plus scheme expands on an existing scheme and is expected to encourage more players to come clean on cartelizing behaviour.

“Introduction of the settlement provision under Section 48A of the Competition Act is a ground-breaking amendment that holds the potential to facilitate early market corrections and minimize litigation. While the government has not yet notified this provision, we are actively engaged in formulating the necessary regulations. Public comments will be invited on the draft regulations to ensure a comprehensive and inclusive approach,” Kaur said.

To a question on how the regulator will ensure businesses have faith in the commitment and settlement schemes, which is crucial for them to seek this remedy instead of going to courts, and how officials’ honest decisions will be protected from scrutiny later on, Kaur said that CCI’s decision-making is statutory and is based on principles of natural justice.

“The statutory processes have in-built checks and balances ensuring transparency and independence in decision-making. Once commitment and settlement provisions are notified by the government, and transparent procedures for the same have been put in place, I am sure many issues as contemplated may not arise. CCI enjoys the trust of businesses due to its transparency, consistent application of provisions and clear communication about the benefits and potential outcomes of the procedure.”

Framing regulations to operationalize the provisions of the Competition Amendment Act of 2023 is a priority, Kaur said.

With a full quorum now after a gap of over six months, CCI is trying to clear pending cases relating to anti-competitive issues and GST-related profiteering. “These cases have their unique complexities and procedural safeguards, which we have to bear in mind while accelerating disposal,” the chairperson said.

Till the time a new Digital Competition Bill, which will set the code of conduct for Big Tech, CCI will continue to advocate what is good behaviour, the way it has already flagged concerns around surge pricing by cab aggregators and promotion of its own private labels by e-commerce platforms. “Our advocacy measures do help shape the behaviour of companies nudging them towards competition compliance,” said Kaur, referring to two studies done by CCI on e-commerce and cab aggregators. The regulator advocated cab aggregator platforms adopt self-regulatory measures to address concerns around information asymmetry and transparency.

“In the recent past, we have examined issues such as dominance and potential abuse by Big Tech companies, data practices and privacy concerns, platform policies, and self-preferencing and have provided clear mandates through our orders,” Kaur said. Earlier, CCI asked e-commerce platforms in 2020 to be more open about how they rank products and services in response to customer searches and to ensure that user reviews are genuine. The regulator also told them to have transparent policies on what they do with the data collected on transactions. That advice was based on a nine-month market study on the e-commerce market in the country covering 16 online platforms, 164 businesses, seven payment system providers and several industry bodies.

Updated: 02 Jul 2023, 11:50 PM IST