The Delhi High Court on Tuesday asked the Centre and the Competition Commission of India (CCI) to place on record their replies to Apple Inc’s petition challenging the regulator’s demand for the company’s audited financial statements and the amended penalty framework under competition law that allows fines based on global turnover.
A bench led by Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Tushar Rao Gedela noted that the Union Ministry of Corporate Affairs and the CCI had filed their counter affidavits a day earlier, but the documents were not yet on record. The court directed that the replies be formally placed before it and granted Apple time to file its rejoinder. The matter has been listed for further hearing on January 27.
During the hearing, senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, appearing for Apple, told the court that the company received the joint reply from the ministry and the CCI late on Monday night and sought time to respond. The bench accepted the request.
The proceedings also saw the Alliance of Digital India Foundation inform the court that it has filed an impleadment application, stating it was the original informant and complainant in the case against Apple. The court allowed parties four weeks to file objections, if any, to the impleadment plea.
The case stems from Apple’s challenge to a CCI direction requiring it to furnish audited financial statements for multiple years as part of an ongoing competition law probe. Apple has also questioned amendments to the Competition Act, 2002, which permit the regulator to levy penalties based on a company’s global turnover rather than turnover limited to the relevant product or service in the Indian market.
In its petition, Apple argued that the amended provisions allow the aggregation of turnover from all products and services of an enterprise for penalty computation, instead of restricting it to the affected relevant market. The company contended that the changes enable the CCI to consider global turnover, including revenues generated outside India, rather than turnover from the Indian market alone.
Apple further submitted that under the amended law, firms found guilty of abuse of dominance or anti-competitive conduct can be fined up to 10 per cent of their average turnover for the preceding three financial years. On this basis, the company claimed its potential maximum exposure could be around USD 38 billion, calculated as 10 per cent of its average global turnover for the financial years 2022 to 2024.
Earlier, the High Court had sought an explanation from the government on how penalties based on global turnover could be justified when the alleged abuse of dominance relates to only one of several products. Responding to this, senior advocate Balbir Singh, appearing for the Centre and the CCI, argued that the provision was necessary to ensure that even entities with no turnover in India could be brought within the regulator’s reach.
He also alleged that Apple had approached the court to derail the ongoing CCI investigation, maintaining that the regulator had sought only India-specific turnover details, not global figures. According to the government, Apple was asked to provide its India turnover by December 8, after which the information would take three to four weeks to be examined.
The High Court had issued notice to the ministry and the CCI on Apple’s plea on December 1, directing them to file their replies within a week. The dispute now awaits further consideration when the matter comes up next month.
