New Delhi: The Competition Commission of India (CCI) investigated a total of 35 cartel cases across various sectors over the last five financial years (till March 13, 2025).
CCI has signed Bilateral/Multilateral MoU with Egypt, Mauritius, Japan, Brazil, BRICS (Brazil, the Russian Federation, People’s Republic of China and the Republic of South Africa), Canada, European Commission, Australia and US Department of Justice (DOJ) for cooperation in the field of competition law and policy.
These MoUs include provision for enforcement cooperation between CCI and its MoU partners, subject to their respective legal framework, constraints, enforcement interests and available resources.
In addition, India has signed 14 FTAs with its trading partners. Some of these FTAs have a separate Chapter on Competition, according to which each Party shall, in accordance with its laws and regulations, take measures which it considers appropriate against anticompetitive activities, in order to facilitate trade and investment flows between the Parties and the efficient functioning of its market.
The Commission has a division for trend analysis and conducting research in various sectors of the economy to have a holistic view and to detect any anti-competitive activities.
The Competition (Amendment) Act, 2023 introduced the concept of “lesser penalty plus” within the framework of Section 46 of the Act. Consequently, on February 20, 2024, the CCI (Lesser Penalty) Regulations, 2024 were notified, replacing the 2009 regulations and introducing a “lesser penalty plus”(LPP) mechanism to incentivize disclosures of cartels.
The LPP mechanism was introduced to incentivize an existing lesser penalty applicant in respect of a cartel to give full, true, and vital disclosures about another cartel, hitherto not in the knowledge of the CCI.
To further widen the scope of cartel investigation, Hub & Spoke mechanism has been incorporated by introducing the Proviso in Section 3(3) of the Competition Act, 2002 through the Amendment Act 2023 which provides that an enterprise or association of enterprises or a person or association of persons though not engaged in identical or similar trade shall also be presumed to be part of the agreement under this sub-section if it participates or intends to participate in the furtherance of such agreement.
CCI, through its enforcement and advocacy mandate, seeks to promote and sustain competition in the markets by conducting market studies and advocacy events, imparting training about competition issues besides carrying out market corrections to eliminate distortions.