The Competition Commission of India (aka CCI) has dropped cartelisation charges on nine foreign carriers.

The news comes after the Travel Agents Association of India (aka TAAI) had pressed the CCI to move forward with charges over accusations that the airlines were abusing their dominant positions and grouping together against the local organisation.

The dispute came about when the nine carriers –which include Swiss International, Lufthansa, Air France-KLM, Continental, Singapore Airlines, Northwest Airlines and Air Canada- announced in December of 2009 that they would stop paying travel agents commission for ticket booking services.

TAAI claimed that the group of airlines were from just two alliance networks, Star Alliance and SkyTeam, and had joined hands in an ‘anti-competitive’ move. An official from the organisation said that commission was a ‘legitimate right’ for travel agents, citing the 1934 Aircraft Act.

However after a more than one-year review of the ordeal by the CCI’s investigation wing it concluded that the group of airlines didn’t in facet a have a dominant market share. When combined they account for about 17-20% of the Indian air travel market, which according to the CCI did not account for a Monopoly of flights to and from India.