In one of the first verdicts on the jurisdiction of the recently empowered competition regulator – the Competition Commission of India (CCI) – Bombay High Court has dismissed the writ petitions filed in Aamir Khan Productions Private Limited & Others v The Competition Commission of India & Ors. The court has upheld the CCI’s show cause notices of December 2009 issued to the petitioners for allegedly forming a cartel during their row with multiplex owners.
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The court held that “every tribunal has the jurisdiction to determine the existence or otherwise of the jurisdictional fact, unless the statute establishing the tribunal provides otherwise”. It added that the Competition Act, 2002, makes clear that the CCI has the jurisdiction to find out if the facts exist on which it could carry out an investigation.
This case follows a dispute between actor and producer Aamir Khan and a few other producers and the owners of India’s multiplex cinemas – the FICCI-Multiplex Association of India. Following a dispute over sharing of revenues the former had decided not to screen their films at multiplex cinemas. This prompted the owners of the multiplexes to complain to the CCI about the cartel like activities of the film producers. Operating cartels violate provisions of the Competition Act and on deciding that a prima facie case existed, the CCI it issued the show cause notices late last year.
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The update of court judgments is compiled by Bhasin & Co, Advocates, a corporate law firm based in New Delhi. The authors can be contacted at lbhasin@bhasinco.in or lbhasin@gmail.com. Readers should not act on the basis of this information without seeking professional legal advice.
