JUDGMENT :

T. Raja, J.

Prayer: Appeal filed under Clause 15 of the Letters Patent against the order dated 06.03.2018 made in W.P.No.35255 of 2015.

1. Having suffered an order of dismissal of its writ petition, M/s MRF Limited has brought this writ appeal, challenging the correctness of the impugned order passed by the learned single Judge.

2. Shri G.Masilamani, learned Senior Counsel appearing for the appellant pleaded that the fourth respondent-All India Tyre Dealers’ Federation, hereinafter referred to as “the AITDF” sent a representation dated 28.11.2013 to the first respondent-Ministry of Corporate Affairs, hereinafter referred to as "the MCA" and the said representation was forwarded by the MCA to the second respondent-Competition Commission of India, hereinafter referred to as "the CCI" on 16.12.2013. The representation alleged that when natural rubber price increased, the tyre prices were increased in a concerted manner by the domestic major tyre manufacturers, however, when the price of natural rubber decreased, the tyre prices were not reduced by the domestic major tyre manufacturers and as such, they indulged in price parallelism and cartelization. In order to support the said allegations, the AITDF mentioned some unauthenticated natural rubber prices for certain years, instead of showing the rubber board price. Neither the actual tyre price nor the year or the name of the company were mentioned in the said representation. Without even showing any proof of price parallelism, the allegation of cartelization under Section 3 of the Competition Act, 2002 cannot stand up.

3. Shri G.Masilamani, continuing his arguments, contended that it is common knowledge that to make a comparison, there must be minimum two parameters. While arriving at the price parallelism between the opposite parties, who are 5 in number, the tyre prices of each of the opposite parties are necessary. Similarly, for price comparison, inter se tyres of inter se tyre producers are also necessary. In the representation given by AITDF, only one parameter, namely, rubber prices increase and decrease alone were given, but the actual tyre prices of none of the opposite parties were stated. Therefore, without the actual tyre prices of opposite parties, the allegation of AITDF, namely, concerted increase of tyre prices, price parallelism and cartelization were not at all made out even prima facie. With only one parameter, namely, the rubber prices for certain years, no comparison can be made without the actual prices of tyres of opposite parties. Learned Senior Counsel further contended that the above representation failed to qualify to be a reference under Section 19(1)(b) of the Competition Act, as it does not conform to Regulation 2(j) read with Regulation 10(2), 11(2) and 15 of the Competition Commission of India (General) Regulations, 2009. The CCI, by order dated 7.1.2014, asked the MCA and the AITDF to address preliminary arguments. The CCI, noticing the statement made by the representative of the MCA that they have no further submission to make in this regard, allowed the prayer of the MCA for exemption from further proceedings. Thereafter, the CCI, having heard the fourth respondent-AITDF and the ninth respondent-Automotive Tyre Manufacturers’ Association, passed the order dated 24.6.2014 impugned in the writ petition under Section 26(1) of the Competition Act directing the Additional Director General, the third respondent herein to conduct an investigation in the matter.

4. Questioning the action of the MCA in forwarding the letter dated 16.12.2013 to the CCI as a sheer non application of mind, it has been argued that it was not a valid reference, for the simple reason that the said reference failed to contain even the basic minimum requirement of the allegedly offending actual tyre prices. Shri G.Masilamani, finding fault with the MCA for forwarding the representation of the AITDF dated 28.11.2013 to the CCI to take suo motu action against the major tyre m