It came as a big reprieve for tech giant Google after the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) reduced the penalty imposed on the American multinational corporation by the Competition Commission of India (CCI) for abusing its commanding role in Play store policies from Rs 936.44 crore to Rs 216. 69 crore.
An NCLAT bench composed of Justice Ashok Bhushan and Justice Arun Baroka upheld the CCI’s 2022 observations against Google’s parent company, Alphabet, but recalculated the penalty amount and mentioned it for its fresh evaluation. The bench directed the tech giant to pay the remaining part of the amount as it has already paid 10%.
The verdict came after Google had filed an appeal against CCI’s 2022 decision as it found the company guilty of violating provisions of the Competition Act 2022.
The CCI had fined Google Rs 936.44 crore after learning that the company was taking advantage of its dominant role in markets for licensable operating systems and app store for Android devices for unfairly mandating its billing system for paid apps.
The CCI observed that such practice restrained competition by suppressing innovation among app developers. It found that it denied access to payment aggregators, which was like barring competition, and it violates the Act too.
