When India’s largest oil explorer opened a tender for a cement order in 2018 the competing bids were all exactly 7,000 rupees per metric ton. Oil and Natural Gas Corporation queried the bids and got a wry reply from an executive at India Cements. Seven was his “lucky number”.
ONGC quietly lodged an antitrust case against three Indian cement companies. A five-year probe found a decade of price collusion targeting state-run ONGC. The Indian cement firms’ bid rigging, discussions of supply patterns and efforts to oust foreign bidders were “substantiated from strong evidences in form of communication, meetings, emails, admission,” said the 90-page report.
Dalmia Bharat declined comment. India Cements, which was acquired by No. 1 player UltraTech (ULTC.NS) didn’t respond, and neither did Shree Digvijay, ONGC or the CCI. The cement companies have been asked to respond to the report and the watchdog will then issue a final order within months. It has powers to drop any of the investigation findings, but fines can go as high as three times the companies’ profit. In 2024-25, Dalmia Bharat had annual revenues of $1.5 billion, Shree Digvijay $79 million and India Cements $444 million. The onus of breaches are on 8 top executives
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Included are former managing director of Shree Digvijay, Rajeev Nambiar; billionaire chairman of Dalmia Bharat, Y.H. Dalmia; and former managing director of India Cements, N. Srinivasan. |
Shree Digvijay and Dalmia also targeted foreign firms who bid against them. They repeatedly filed complaints with the Indian government about foreign bidders’ lack of certification and how New Delhi should promote domestic firms over foreign ones.
The companies tried at least once to pressure ONGC to cancel foreign bids by “restricting supply” of cement to the oil explorer, which breaches antitrust laws.
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