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New Delhi: The government consulted over 100 entities including some of the businesses likely to be impacted by the proposed digital competition law, such as Amazon, Apple India Pvt. Ltd, Flipkart and Google, and their suggestions are under consideration, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman informed Lok Sabha on Monday.
The minister told the House in a written reply that pre-legislative consultations on the Draft Digital Competition Bill were held as per the ministry of corporate affairs’ policy.
Closed-door consultations were held in March 2023 during the drafting of the bill, with entities and stakeholders likely to be impacted by the law, the minister informed.
“More than 100 stakeholders submitted responses, ranging from legal professionals, industry associations, civil society organizations, and domestic and foreign digital enterprises providing digital services in India,” the minister said.
This was followed up by seeking public feedback this year on the draft bill in e-consultation mode, the minister informed. The suggestions are being examined, the minister said.
Stakeholder discussions were also organized by ministry of electronics and information technology in June.
The Bill seeks to protect competition in the market and proposes a code of conduct or ex-ante regulation to prevent irreversible market tipping by influential digital players.
The current regime of Competition Commission of India’s (CCI’s) investigation into an anti-competitive practice after it has taken place is thought to be both resource and time intensive in achieving market correction. The proposed law has borrowed the concept of digital market gatekeepers who should abide by the code of conduct, from similar legislation in the European Union which became effective from 2 May 2023.
EU’s Digital Markets Act covers large digital platforms providing core platform services such as online search, app stores and messenger services, and have to comply with certain obligations as well as prohibitions. The gatekeeper entities, called systemically significant digital enterprises in the Indian Bill, will be identified by financial and market presence related criteria.
