P&A Associates has won yet again in the Competition Appellate Tribunal (Compat) for its clients MCX against Amarchand representing the National Stock Exchange (NSE), after NSE appealed the Competition Commission of India’s (CCI) 2011 order against it.

The Compat agreed with the CCI that the NSE had abused its dominant position, fining it 5 per cent of its turnover, coming to around Rs 55 crore, as reported by Mint and others.

For MCX, P&A managing partner Anand Pathak with associates Abhijeet Sinha, Akshay Nanda and Durga Bose instructed senior counsel AN Haksar with his juniors Udayan Jain and Chitra Parande.

Pathak said that the Compat had “expanded the relevant market and accepted our definition of the relevant market that the market includes all stock exchange services”, going with the director generals (DG) view and against the CCI’s narrower market definition of derivatives services alone.

Pathak. “I believe that NSE lost more in the Compat,” commented Pathak, explaining that the CCI order was only a majority order, whereas the Compat was unanimous in its order.

Pathak commented that “it’s a very, very important order because it settles quite a lot of law around section 4”, dealing with abuse of dominance, and in particular around the definition of relevant market, dominance and abuse.

Amarchand partners Pallavi Shroff and Naval Chopra with Prateek Bhattacharya and Aman Singh Sethi acted for the NSE, instructing senior advocate Amit Sibal. Senior counsel Harish Salve and Abhishek Manu Singhvi had also been instructed earlier in the case, said Pathak.

The CCI was represented by DSK Legal Delhi partner Balbir Singh, who is standing counsel for the anti-trust regulator, together with Abhishek Singh Baghel, Monica Benjamin and Shabistan Aquil, according to the order.

Compat order vs NSE for MCX