On Monday, the Supreme Court transferred all cases questioning the Competition Commission of India’s antitrust probe against Amazon & Flipkart to itself. All these cases have been directed to the Karnataka High Court for a debottlenecked hearing, which, too, the court has sought early disposal of.
The order was passed by a two-member bench of the NCLT comprising Justices Abhay S Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan after hearing a transfer petition from the CCI. It is a petition which prayed that all related cases that were pending in the different High Courts, Delhi High Court, Madras High Court, Punjab and Haryana High Court, and the High Courts of Telangana and Allahabad, should be transferred to this Court to avoid delay in the investigation. It was specifically ordered that all petitions must be grouped to be heard by one judge of the Karnataka High Court at the principal seat at Bengaluru.
The Supreme Court also sought the transfer of the single Judge hearing it from the Dharwad bench to Bengaluru to enhance efficiency as per its ruling by the Chief Justice of the Karnataka High Court. The Karnataka High Court touched a few benches during the hearing and is expected to start a full hearing on consolidated SACFA cases on January 15.
The attorney general, R Venkataramani, who appeared for the CCI, drew the court’s attention to the issues arising out of multiple proceedings. He pointed out that after the filing of the transfer petition, five other petitions have been filed in other high courts, and there might be others because of the ongoing investigation.
Abhishek Manu Singhvi, senior advocate representing one of the e-commerce companies, welcomed the Supreme Court decision, arguing that 46% of the cases are already filed in Karnataka, where the petitioner arguments ended. He embraced the merger, saying that it would guarantee the integration of awarding decisions and curb further delay of the antitrust investigation.
This is viewed as positive progress in unbinding judicial procedures and helping deliver the antitrust probes concerning Amazon and Flipkart.
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