In a significant ruling, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) has held the All India Film Employees Confederation, Federation of Western India Cine Employees (FWICE) and its allied 20 craft associations to be indulging in anti-competitive practices under Section 3 of the Indian Competition Act. They were alleged to have been restricting film and TV producers from hiring persons who are not their members as artists.
The CCI in its order held, “The associations have used their position to disrupt competition and fair-play in the market through their ant-competitive conduct. Through the provisions of clause 6 and 18 of the MOU, the OPs have indulged in anti-competitive conduct such as issuing non-cooperative directives, prohibiting hiring of specialized non-member, artists, conducting vigilance checks, stalling shoots for hiring non-members and levying of penalty. All this amounts to limiting and controlling the services in the Western Indian Film and Television Industry. Even after the expiry of the said MOU on 28.02.2015, the OPs have continued to enforce the anti-competitive clauses.”
While considering the issue of monetary penalty, the CCI after taking into account the peculiarity of facts and totality of circumstances involved, held that no monetary penalty should be imposed.
This post has been authored by Aparmita Pratap of West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata.
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