Competition Law And Digital Platform Services In India

Resmi C.S, LLM (Business Law) & Advocate

ABSTRACT

There are about 1.2 billion mobile subscribers and 560 million internet subscribers in India, making it the world's second-largest digital consumer base (behind China). Indians got online at a rate of 207 million per year between 2013 and 2018, with a treble growth in smartphone use. In India, the regulations governing an e-commerce company have been slow to develop and are still in their infancy. Electronic commerce's rapid expansion has helped the market become more competitive, and it has also connected rural economies to the national economy, allowing for speedier integration. Around 100 to 200 million people in India's sub-rural and rural areas have access to e-commerce, allowing for a wide range of options and new growth opportunities for the brick-and-mortar retail business, which was formerly a wholly separate industry. Digital platforms that offer "free" services are the focus of this article, which examines how Indian competition law applies to them. Zero-price digital platforms provide new problems to standard regulatory approaches because of their size and peculiarities. When it comes to consumer welfare losses, a critical review of the established methodology is in order. This paper will discuss the dominance of these platforms and the balancing acts of CCI on privacy as an abuse of dominance. Further, this paper will discuss ex-ante regulations for digital platforms and unfair P2B contract terms in India.

Keywords: Competition Law, E-commerce, Foreign Direct Investment, Indian Laws, Digitalization, India.