Digital commerce has brought in technology-driven challenges for assessing free market: Nirmala Sitharaman

Praising the Competition Commission of India (CCI), Finance and Corporate Affairs Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Tuesday that the world is faced with newer challenges with the ongoing evolution of e-commerce, and the regulator is facing these challenges “very well”. “The strength of any commission is to anticipate what is happening and what is likely to happen particularly in a country like India, where despite opening up our economy in 1991, the progession towards opening has been, if I can say, steady but could have been faster,” said the Union Minister. She was addressing the CCI’s Annual Day function in the national capital.

“Equally, the challenges globally of competition, the spike and sudden increase in the electronic way of doing business, the digital commerce, have all brought in absolutely newer technology-driven challenges for assessing free market. So, CCI is actually functioning amidst all these challenges and is still in its teens,” she said.

Today, CCI is facing these challenges boldly while anticipating the changes in the market and staying relevant to the needs of the time, according to the Union Minister.

The country’s fair trade regulator CCI, established under the Competition Act, 2002, became fully functional in 2009.

India’s nascent e-commerce industry is projected to grow exponentially over the next few years, wit estimates pegging a CAGR to the tune of 15 per cent between between FY24 and FY30.

“It is not just a celebration of an institution but also the confirmation of the principle that the markets must work for many and not just for few,” she added.

Meanwhile, over the past few years, the CCI has taken a range of initiatives to enhance transparency, to improve regulatory processes, and to make its operations more accessible to stakeholders.

Through its enforcement and advocacy mandate, the CCI 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.