22 May 2012
A two-day workshop has been organized jointly by UNCTAD and the Competition Commission of India on Competition Law and State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) on 21-22 May 2012, in New Delhi, India, with the participation of the Minister of Corporate Affairs.
The panellists included experts from the European Commission, Korean Fair Trade Commission, Russian Federal Antimonopoly Service, United Kingdom, Department of Trade and Industry of South Africa, Australia, CUTS and UNCTAD.
The workshop aimed to bring together representatives from various competition authorities, federal government ministries and state owned enterprises, and non-governmental organizations in order to exchange experiences and perspectives concerning competition law enforcement vis-à-vis SOEs.
In his opening statement, Dr. Veerappa Moily, Minister of Corporate Affairs, announced that the Indian Government is in the process of adopting a National Competition Policy that will aim to achieve highest sustainable levels of economic growth, entrepreneurship and employment. Dr. Veerappa Moily congratulated the Competition Commission of India for completing three years of enforcement of competition laws. He observed that some of the decisions of CCI have proved to be important milestones in ensuring free play of market forces in a liberalized economy.
Dr. Veerappa Moily stated that the objective of competition law was to protect competition and not the competitors. He highlighted the need for competition to be promoted, protected and nurtured through appropriate regulatory mechanism. Policies initiated and pursued in various sectors like manufacturing, electricity, telecommunications, roads, transport, civil aviation, tourism etc. have yielded rich dividends so far. Dr. Moily stated that there have been a large number of new entrepreneurs during the last two decades following the introduction of competition in markets.
Ashok Chawla, Chairman, Competition Commission of India stressed on the need to raise awareness amongst the SOEs about the Competition Act so that they could have robust competition compliance and good operating practices that could be emulated by their private counterparts.
During the discussion on competition neutrality and SOEs, UNCTAD referred to the recommended practices in this area and presented the research carried out on this topic under the Research Partnership Platform (RPP). Competition Commission of India agreed to join the RPP research project and to submit a report on the challenges of introducing competition neutrality in India.
