A Comparative Study of Extra Territorial Competition Laws and Analyzing the Limitations in Its Application

The international markets are currently witnessing a phase of globalization and vast expansion of trade as a result of liberalization, less barriers on trade and non-restrictive import and export practices. The duty of the competition law is to prevent any conduct of the industries in a market that could cause appreciable adverse effect on competition in market, be economically disadvantageous to the consumer. It is important to understand that liberalization and globalization also raises concern of anti-competitive activities. Anti-competitive activities may be adopted by India based companies or foreign based company who are trading in India. In order to curb Anti-competitive actions of foreign companies, the Act is equipped with the extra territorial applications of competition law through Section-32. The provision deals with acts that occur outside the territory of India but has a significant adverse effect in India and the act allows for the commission to investigate such matters and pass orders as it finds fit. This research paper aims on doing a comparison of the extra territorial competition laws in the Indian scenario with that of the European Union and the United States. Additionally, the paper tries to look into the limitations that the commission faces in the applications of the extra-territorial laws.