Regulation of Trade Association Activities

D P S Verma Trade associations have been instrumental in a number of restrict ire trade practices by various manufacturers or traders particularly price fixing in concert collective boycott, exclusion from association membership, and restricting persons to whom goods arc sold. Such associations mainly operated in the distributive trade of consumer goods and the provisions of commercial services such as transport, advertising and custom clearing and forwarding. The MR TP Commission has taken a serious view in all the cases of restrictive trade practices brought before it However, the number of trade associations whose activities have been examined by the Commission constitute an insignificant fraction of the total number of associations operating in India.