CCI working to improve quality of investigations, says Sikri

Competition Commission is working to improve the quality as well as reduce the time taken for completion of anti-trust investigations, its Chairman D K Sikri said today.
Acknowledging that the regulator is facing a variety of challenges, including procedural and jurisdictional issues, he said the endeavour is to base its decisions on "sound economics".
In the last nine years, Competition Commission of India (CCI) has dealt with more than 700 cases of anti-competitive agreements and abuse of dominant position in diverse fields including cement, real estate, steel and coal.
"On the anti-trust side, we are working to improve the quality of investigations and reduce the time taken to ensure optimal use of resources," Sikri said here.

CCI has been grappling with manpower shortage for quite sometime and is making efforts to strengthen capacity building.
"We are going through an evolutionary phase where we are facing a variety of challenges. They are procedural, jurisdictional and related to interpretation as well as capacity related.

"We are constantly evaluating ourselves and improving our working keeping with the evolving jurisprudence and international best practices," he said.
He was speaking at the CCI's Annual Day Lecture, which was delivered by Corporate Affairs Minister Arun Jaitley.
According to him, the constant endeavour of the commission is to base its decisions on sound economics and ensure enforcement of competition law in a fair, consistent, predictable and transparent manner.

Noting that the regulator has the onerous responsibility of ensuring a well functioning market, Sikri emphasised it is responding to stakeholder concerns.
Competition Appellate Tribunal Chairman G S Singhvi said that in the past six to seven years, CCI has been able to develop a sustainable jurisprudence in the field of competition.
"During the working of the tribunal and (while) deciding the cases, we have found certain grey areas in the Act itself and regulations framed thereunder.
"I would request the minister to pay attention to the deficiencies in the Act and remove the same so that we can develop a robust jurisprudence in the times to come," he noted.