ABSTRACT
Though mergers between large business firms have been negotiated and concluded right through the post-independence period in India, a full list of mergers or amalgamations settled during each year has been published only since 1972-73. For this reason, the discussion in this chapter of the overall trends in mergers and acquisitions in the private corporate sector is restricted to the period 1972-73 to 2009-10. However, the constrained choice of the year 1972-73 as the cut-off period is not wholly inappropriate because a number of significant changes in government policies became operative just in that year or without delay. These changes were heralded, inter alia, through the abolition of the managing agency system, the passage of the Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Practices (MRTP) Act 1969, the nationalisation of the banking system in 1969, and the announcement of new provisions granting tax relief in the Finance Bill of 1967.1 Many of these initiatives were aimed at curtailing the power of the big business houses and dealing with the adverse consequences of the absence of price competition among the established business groups. They, therefore, affected the process of growth through mergers as well.
