The Supreme Court (SC) on Monday, August 9 rejected a plea filed by e-commerce retailers Amazon and Flipkart challenging a probe ordered by the Competition Commission of India (CCI) against them for alleged violation of competition laws. The two companies must face an inquiry by the CCI for anti-competition agreements, the SC said while refusing to interfere with the order of the Karnataka High Court, which had refused to stall the CCI investigation.
A bench led by Chief Justice of India (CJI) N V Ramana said, “We expect big organisations like Amazon and Flipkart to voluntarily go for enquiry and you don't want even that?. You have to submit and enquiry has to be permitted.” The bench added, “We see no reason to interfere in order. Seeing that the time granted is expiring on 9 August, we extend it by four weeks.”
The bench of CJI Ramana and Justice Surya Kant was hearing an appeal by Flipkart and Amazon against the July 23 order of the Karnataka High Court that refused to set aside a probe ordered by the CCI against the two companies.
Earlier, on July 23, the Karnataka High Court had dismissed a petition filed by the e-commerce majors against the CCI investigation into its business practices. The court upheld the June 11 verdict of a single-judge bench, which had allowed the investigation ordered by the antitrust body to continue. The appeal was heard by a division bench of Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Nataraj Rangaswamy.
Stating that the appeals were “devoid of merit and substance”, the bench said that the companies should not shy away from being probed if they are not involved in any violation of provisions of the Competition Act, 2002. The bench reportedly said that the inquiry cannot be crushed at the initial stage and dismissed the petitions stating that they did not find any reason to interfere.
On January 13, 2020, antitrust regulator CCI ordered a probe against Flipkart and Amazon for alleged malpractices, including deep discounting and partnerships with preferred sellers on their platforms, following which both companies had moved the High Court, seeking to quash the probe order.