Jaitley cautions against regulatory overlaps

New Delhi, Dec 1: Active and responsive regulators ensure fair play but emergence of multi-sectoral regulators raises concerns about their crossing each other's jurisdictional areas, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said today.

Mergers and acquisitions would continue to create big corporate conglomerates but there is a need to draw a red line to avoid dominance and curbing of open competition in market by them, he said while addressing a conference on competition issues here.

According to him, there is a need to have an active and responsive regulator. However, Jaitley cautioned about growth of multi- sectoral regulators in recent times and chances of their crossing in each other's jurisdictional areas. He was inaugurating the International Competition Network (ICN) Merger workshop here, organised by Competition Commission of India (CCI).

Stressing that people learn from global experiences, he said: "If two telecom majors are to amalgamate, will there be common turf areas between the telecom regulator and market regulator CCI. Therefore, how do you built the jurisdiction of the two. Obviously jurisdiction in this area is emerging."

Meanwhile, the government is in the process of implementing a large number of legislative and administrative recommendations of the Financial Sector Reforms Commission (FSLRC), which had suggested a major overhauling of financial sector regulations.

"As the change in process of reform continues... I have not the least doubt that a large number of these (FSLRC) recommendations will actually see implementation in the days to come," Jaitley had said last week. FSLRC, chaired by Justice B N Srikrishna, has suggested a non-sectoral, principle-based approach to revamp the existing framework. Among various suggestions, the FSLRC has suggested creation of a unified financial sector regulator comprising SEBI, IRDA, FMC and part of RBI.

PTI