With the notification of amended regulations, the Competition Commission can now delegate enforcement of its orders to other agencies.
The move also comes amidst some hesitation of the entities to comply with the said orders as they find some entities flagging some norms that are issued by the regulator tasked with maintaining the value of competition.
The Competition Commission of India In General Regulations of the year 2024 were gazetted out on Tuesday.
Now agencies can be appointed by CCI to supervise how these orders are adhered to. The agencies can be accounting firms, management consultancy or any other professional organisation or chartered accountants, company secretaries or cost accountants.
“Where the Commission is of the opinion that the implementation of its orders issued under Section 31 of the Act or orders issued under Section 48A or Section 48B or orders issued under any other Section of the Act or the provisions of the regulations made there under, is to be tracked in the management of enforcement under the relevant section of supervision, then the Commission may through the oversight Committee give instructions on the subject of such implementation, at such terms and conditions as the Commission may consider appropriate,” according to the new regulations.
Section 48A and 48B pertains to compliance concern and compliance concern and Section 31 addresses the mergers and acquisition orders.
Non-implementation or non-compliance with any order of the Commission shall be prohibited and amongst such, the agency shall have the ability to notify CCI on such.
The government may appoint agencies for this purpose in regard to various types of orders, implying mergers and acquisitions orders as well.
The rules have seen other amendments made, including setting a duration of 180 days for completion of a final order once an interim order is put in place.
Following the modifications to Competition Act in April 2023, Indian competition authority carried out an overhaul of its general regulations. Public consultations were conducted before the amendments were made to the regulations too.
