Key Points
Digital firms, including Apple, Google, Meta, Amazon, Walmart-backed Flipkart and Uber, resisted ex-ante obligations for large players under a new digital competition law, in their suggestions to an official committee under corporate affairs secretary Manoj Govil, showed the panels report released on Tuesday...
Some of them chose to endorse such regulations only under conditions, including tailor-made provisions to suit the Indian context, according to the panels report...
However, a number of other entities, including the All India Gaming Federation, Asia Travel Technology Industry Association, the Confederation of All India Traders, the Digital News Publishers Association, the Federation of Hotel & Restaurant Associations of India, the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations, the Newspaper Association of India and the National Restaurant Association of India, endorsed the ex-ante framework for systemically important digital intermediaries...
The Govil panel has now recommended separate digital competition legislation with an ex-ante framework after holding meetings with a cross-section of stakeholders, including the large digital players who had submitted their views...
The threshold of companies that would come under any such new law shouldnt impact smaller players, it said.. Bodies such as the Centre for the Digital Future, the India Cellular and Electronics Association, the Internet and Mobile Association of India and the US-India Business Council have opposed the new law, the panels report showed..
