The Competition Commission of India (CCI) on Thursday refused to order an investigation into allegations of anti-competitive conduct against Reliance Jio Infocomm Private Limited and over 4,500 companies across multiple sectors. According to reports from Bar and Bench, the plea filed by one Goutam Mohanta accused companies operating across sectors including telecommunications, logistics, Government e-Marketplace (GeM) procurement, energy, infrastructure, cement, steel, healthcare, pharmaceuticals and real estate of indulging in price coordination, market sharing, bid-rigging, exclusionary practices and abuse of dominance in violation of the Competition Act. A coram comprising CCI Chairperson Ravneet Kaur and Members Sweta Kakkad and Deepak Anurag closed the case after finding that the allegations were generic, speculative and unsupported by evidence.
In the telecom sector, the complainant alleged that operators in eastern and north-eastern India offered similar tariff structures, including common 28-day and 84-day recharge periods, and adopted comparable pricing and data policies. However, as reported by Bar and Bench, the CCI found that the allegations were based only on a comparison of publicly available recharge plans and were unsupported by any evidence indicating coordination or a 'meeting of minds' among the companies. The commission held that 'mere existence of parallel or similar pricing in an oligopolistic market cannot by itself be prima facie indicative of prohibited conduct under Section 3 of the Act'. The CCI concluded that ordering an investigation on such material would amount to conducting a 'roving and fishing inquiry' without foundational facts.
The complaint also alleged price alignment, route allocation and exclusionary practices in the logistics sector, claiming that independent operators quoted substantially identical freight rates for transporting commodities such as cement, clinker, fertilisers and coal. According to Bar and Bench, the commission noted that no freight quotations, invoices, bid documents, rate charts or correspondence had been submitted to substantiate the claims, with the entities allegedly involved, relevant routes and the period during which alleged coordination took place not specified. Additionally, the CCI found that allegations of bid-rigging on the GeM platform were found to be unsubstantiated, with the complainant pointing to repeated participation by the same vendors and concentration of contracts among a few companies, but no companies were specifically identified and no material presented to establish coordination.
The CCI also observed that allegations concerning the remaining sectors were broad and lacked sector-specific facts, with no company assigned a specific role in any alleged anti-competitive conduct. As reported by Bar and Bench, the commission held that directing an investigation based on such material would amount to a 'roving and fishing inquiry' without foundational facts. The complainant had alleged that independent operators quoted nearly identical freight rates for transporting commodities such as cement, clinker, fertilisers and coal, but the commission noted that the complaint did not identify the entities involved, the routes or the period during which the alleged coordination took place.
