About Centre

Vision

'Corporate Entity' has become one of the most vibrant and dominating sectors in the commercial world, gaining significance for its dynamic nature and multidimensional approach. This corporate entity is governed by a plethora of laws and regulations that can be broadly categorized as corporate and competition law. The recent years have also seen a paradigm shift in the corporate and competition laws of the country. These changes come in the wake of India’s resolve towards ‘Ease of doing Business’. This entails various parameters such as, starting a business, dealing with construction permits, getting electricity, registering property, getting credit, protecting minority investors, paying taxes, trading across borders, enforcing contracts and resolving insolvency. India’s gradual improvement in rankings by international bodies for ease of doing business, GDP growth and the like are a testimony to the fact that our corporate and competition laws are matching with global standards.

However, we require constant improvement in this subset of our legal system to ensure our sustained success. The present legal system still faces challenges with restrictive trade practices and other anti-competitive issues, corporate governance, corporate frauds, shareholders rights, regulation of securities market, role and responsibility of the directors, corporate liability, insolvency and bankruptcy and the like. These are the concerns of all stakeholders associated with the corporate sector.

The GNLU Centre for Corporate and Competition Law aims to contribute in this field through research, intellectual deliberations, practical output, legal solution and creative awareness; thereby filling the gaps, and easing the hurdles. The Centre was established on 13th October, 2012 by Hon’ble Mr. Justice K. A. Puj, Former. Judge, High Court of Gujarat, with multiple objectives and endeavours to act as a platform to expand the scope and horizon of the corporate and competition law through multidimensional approach and activities.

Mission

To promote research and study of Corporate and Competition law, from a domestic as well as global perspective with a policy and practical oriented purpose. The Centre’s objective is to guide students towards policy oriented study and research of issues impacting corporate regulation, governance and competition law in the context of emerging national and international trends, and opportunities.

Objectives

To carry out research in corporate and competition law.
To organize/conduct academic oriented programs related to the corporate & competition laws.
To provide legal infrastructure to the corporate sector.
To design the research proposals and carry out research in strategic areas of public policy on corporate governance.
To analyze critically, the trends and developments in the institutional, legal and regulatory framework for corporate governance in India and abroad.
To identify training and development needs of the officials of the legal, regulatory agencies associated with implementation of Corporate and Competition Laws including its rules, regulations and guidelines.

Strategic Framework

To analyze the issues of corporate ethics and corporate social responsibility.
To foster interaction between company boards & regulatory authorities and foster the spirit of working as partners for the common good.
To establish a renewed connection between the fields of corporate law and competition law by paying focused attention to corporate finance literature and behavioural economics.
To deal with the issues such as how corporate governance structures of an organization must incorporate the policy of competition and to identify the possible concerns which have come up in many jurisdictions in relations to compliance programmes.
To discuss & understand the Foreign Direct Investment Policy and the Anti-Money laundering, and to find the remedies, deficiencies and analyse the implementation.
To look into various issues relating to frauds which are happening in the corporate sector and try to provide some practicable solutions in order to prevent such frauds.
To deal with various issues relating to the impact of competition policy in India such as Competition Commission of India’s New M&A guidelines, Anti-competitive agreements, cartel issues, Intellectual Property Rights under competition law.
To undertake research on all other areas of ambiguity in the corporate laws.

Awareness, Scholarly and Intellectual Programs

To create awareness, to exchange intellectual ideas and to trace the latest developments in relation to the corporate and competition laws, GNLU Centre for Corporate and Competition Law will provide various forums for discussion and intellectual interactions. Activities such as organizing seminars, conferences and workshops on contemporary pressing issues of law from the field will be undertaken.
The Centre also looks forward to the publication of Journal on Corporate Law and Competition Law.
For the fulfilment of the above strategic programmes, the Centre will look forward for the cooperation, assistance, and collaboration of the various stakeholders, institutions, government organizations, regulatory bodies, and the Ministry etc.

Since 2012, the Centre has been organizing several research, training and extension activities in the field of corporate and competition laws. Some notable events include the National Seminar on Corporate Law: Contemporary Issues & Challenges - Scrutinizing the Investor’s Protection in the Indian Scenario; Two Day GNLU International Conference on Trade & Competition Law; Certificate Course on Corporate Governance; Certificate Course on Distress M&A Deals and The Bankruptcy Code; Half-Day Session on The Companies (Amendment) Bill, 2016 & The Delegated Powers to the Regional Director under the Present Company Legislation; Workshop on The Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 among others. Besides, the Centre regularly organises distnguished lectures on various themes of corporate and competition law. The Centre also conducts the prestigious GNLU Indian Business and Commercial Laws Academy annually which provide a unique opportunity for young and dynamic students of different nationalities to intellectually explore the Indian legal business commercial environment.

Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 is a key pillar of reorganization and insolvency resolution of corporate persons, partnership firms and individuals in a time bound manner for maximization of the value of assets of such persons, to promote entrepreneurship, availability of credit and balance the interests of all the stakeholders. The Code plays an important role in the corporate world and, therefore, to do cutting edge interdisciplinary research between Corporate Law and Insolvency and Bankruptcy Law, the Center for Corporate and Competition Law has been renamed as Centre for Corporate and Insolvency Law with effect from 30th January 2020.