1. The present information has been filed by M/s PDA Trade Fairs (A division of Pradeep Deviah & Associates Pvt. Ltd.) ('the informant') under Section 19(1)(a) of the Competition Act, 2002 ('the Act') against India Trade Promotion Organization ('the opposite party') alleging inter-alia contravention of Section 4 of the Act.

2. The informant is a business organization engaged in the business of organizing international trade fairs, thereby bringing buyers and sellers to one common platform in order to facilitate interaction among them for furthering their respective businesses. For carrying out its business, the informant occasionally hires venues for organizing the said trade fairs.

3. As per the information available in public domain, the opposite party is a nodal agency of Government of India engaged in promoting India's external trade. The opposite party is entrusted with the proactive role of catalysing trade, investment and technology transfer processes for which it, inter-alia, organizes fairs and exhibitions in India and abroad. For the said purpose, the opposite party has the control and management of the venue bookings at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi.

4. The present case pertains to an agreement entered into between the informant and the opposite party wherein the informant booked some halls at Pragati Maidan by making an application to the opposite party, in October 2010, for an event named 'Delhi Wood' 2013. The opposite party through its letter dated 28th September, 2011, intimated the terms and conditions of allotment of halls at Pragati Maidan to the informant.

5. The informant alleged Pragati Maidan to be an exclusive and irreplaceable venue for national and international exhibitions in the capital region, in terms of its area and also in terms its locational advantage. Though the information did not specifically define the relevant market, the facts appear to suggest that the informant tried to establish dominance of the opposite party in the market of 'providing venues for trade fairs/exhibitions in New Delhi'. The opposite party is alleged to be in a monopolistic/dominant situation being a Government of India enterprise, operating independently of competitive forces in the said relevant market. Informant contended that owing to its dominant position, the opposite party had put certain conditions in the allotment letter dated 28th September, 2011, which were unfair or discriminatory and created one-sided and onerous obligations on the informant. The said one-sided conditions pertained to provisional rentals stated in the letter subject to further revision; compulsory payment of 10% booking amount at the time of signing of the licensing agreement which could not be postponed beyond one month of the issue of approval of letter of allotment; payment of further 10% before one year of the start of tenancy period and first installment of 25% before eight months (with two months grace period) being compulsory, failing which the allotment was open to cancellation unilaterally by the opposite party; forfeiture of the whole amount in case of cancellation of booking by informant; very high and arbitrary interest payment on non-adherence to the payment schedule etc. However, any cancellation of booking by the opposite party on account of dislocation or unavailability because of Modernization Programme in Pragati Maidan was allowed as per the allotment letter without any penalty/liability provision on the opposite party.

6. The informant further submitted that when it booked the space for the event, normal annual increase by the opposite party used to be 10%. However, in April 2012, the opposite party revised its rental by increasing it to the tune of 15.7% which was highly unreasonable considering the past year revision trend (around 10%). This affected the internal planning and budgeting of the informant as the rentals provided to the exhibitors could not be changed by the informant. When the opposite party refused to recon