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'Indian players in the digital market should not be dominated by global players, and they should not dominate the smaller players -- these discussions are on.'
The Indian government is not in a hurry to bring in the Digital Competition Bill and wants to follow due process with further deliberations on the proposed legislation before introducing it, Minister of State for Corporate Affairs Harsh Malhotra has said.
Speaking at the 10th National Conference on Economics of Competition Law in New Delhi, he underlined the need for further studying the best practices on digital competition laws in other jurisdictions such as the European Union, Japan, and Australia to assess their relevance to the Indian market.
"There is a need being felt for a Digital Competition Bill.
"We are not in a big rush. After due process, the government wants to bring this Bill," Malhotra said.
"Indian players in the digital market should not be dominated by global players, and they should not dominate the smaller players -- these discussions are on.
"Electronics ministry report on this has to come," the minister said.
He said that while strict interventions were required to enforce the law, self-regulation and compliance should also be promoted.
The country's economic future depends on the strength of its markets, Malhotra said, asserting that fair competition was an important element for it.
The Digital Competition Bill aims to ensure fair competition in India's digital market by preventing anti-competitive practices by large tech companies.
Keeping up with AI, new age economy
Addressing the event, Chairperson of the Competition Commission of India (CCI) Ravneet Kaur stressed the need for regulation to encourage innovation.
Kaur said that amid the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) in the modern market, there could be potential ways of collusion without human intervention, such as price coordination without explicit agreements and algorithmic discrimination under the guise of dynamic pricing.
"Regulators need to be up to date and ahead in this adoption of technology and its implications for competition... Markets are no longer shaped by simple supply and demand.
"There are detailed complex systems, operating currently, where incentives, efficiencies and strategic behaviour intertwine," Kaur said.
Referring to the settlement and commitments provision in the Competition Amendment Act, Kaur said that the CCI is looking at a trust-based regulation that allows stakeholders to come forward, even at the stage of a prima facie opinion, when contraventions are identified.
Kaur said that if the stakeholders are willing to make commitments, the regulator would be open to evaluating them and ensuring quick market corrections.
The CCI chairperson also said that penalties on global turnover would be applicable in cases where turnover figures are either unavailable or not provided by the parties to the regulator.
On Big Tech cases
Kaur said that in the WhatsApp-Meta case, the companies would soon submit their compliance report, which the regulator will study.
The CCI had found the social media platform's data-sharing practices constituted an abuse of dominance and imposed a penalty along with directions for market correction.
Regarding the Amazon-Flipkart abuse of dominance case, the CCI said that 46 petitions were filed by various parties, all of which have been transferred to the Karnataka high court.
"The commission has been very active in (ensuring) that we should not be lost in the way of delivering final orders," Kaur said.
Feature Presentation: Ashish Narsale/Rediff.com
