Law to regulate lobbying in India

Recent news reports suggest that the committee investigating the case of Walmart lobbying the Indian government to allow FDI in the retail sector is going to submit its report shortly.  It is reported that the committee could not find evidence of Walmart bribing any government official or indulging in any unlawful activity.  However, the committee may recommend that the government frame rules to regulate lobbying in India.

In this context, Harsimran Kalra and I published an article in the Oxford India Policy Blog that made a case for regulating lobbying in India.  It also flagged some issues that needs to be debated widely before a law on lobbying is drafted.

The full article can be accessed here.

An excerpt from the article is given below

At present, a few countries have laws to regulate lobbying.  These include Australia, Canada, US, Germany, Hungary, Poland, Lithuania, Slovenia, Israel and Taiwan.  Other countries such as France, Spain, Portugal, India and Japan do not have any such law while UK and Ireland regulate the lobbied.

Although India currently does not regulate lobbying, it is likely to move toward that direction.  Before the government drafts a law, it is essential to get clarity on the activities sought to be regulated and sanctioned.  In this article, we explore how other countries have defined lobbying, the mechanism they adopted to regulate these activities and the lessons India could learn from their experience.