Highlights: Amendments in the Combination Regulations

The Competition Commission of India has further amended the Combination Regulations on 28th March, 2014 to simplify and provide greater clarity on the application of the combination provisions of the Act and the Combination Regulations. 

The highlights of the recent amendments in the Combination Regulations are as under: 

 To provide greater certainty on the requirement of filing notice, it has been clarified that the notification requirement shall be determined with respect to the substance of the transaction and structure of transaction(s) having the effect of avoiding notice shall be disregarded; 

 Item (10) of Schedule I is deleted with a view to avoid ambiguity and uncertainty regarding insufficient local nexus and effect on markets in India; 

 Considering the nature of cases and the resources deployed by the Commission, as well as the assistance provided to parties, it has been decided to revise the fee, from INR 10,00,000 to INR 15,00,000 for Form I, and from INR 40,00,000 to INR 50,00,000 for Form II; 

 It has been decided to delete regulation 29 which was perceived to impose an additional condition in respect of preferring appeal in matters relating to combinations; and 

 Similar to Form I, now the regulations do not require verification on each page of Form II.