BEIJING, February 17 (TMTPOST)— The Indian government is intensifying its scrutiny over Chinese firms and the telecom giant Huawei became its latest target.

Source: Visual China

India’s income tax authorities have raided Huawei’s offices in New Delhi, Gurgaon, a city outside the capital and in the southern tech hub of Bangalore, on suspicion of tax evasion, The Wall Street Journal cited an Indian official on Thursday. Reuters’ sources also revealed the Indian authorities launched a tax investigation at multiple Huawei’premises in these three cities. Officials at the Income Tax department examined financial documents, account books and company records to find out whether Huawei, its Indian businesses and overseas transactions have used illegal means to evade taxes, according to India’s news channel NDTV. It is reported that officials also seized some records.

Huawei is firmly abiding by the local laws and is aware of the tax authorities’ visits at our offices and they met some of employees, the company then responded to the news. “Huawei has confidence on its India businesses’ compliance with all the laws and regulations in the country. We will contact relevant government agencies for more information to work with them and follow the proper procedure,” it added.

China is seriously concern about Indian government’s crackdown against Chinese enterprises, Gao Feng, a spokesperson of the Ministry of Commerce of China, commented on Thursday. It is hoped that India will improve the business environment and treat all the foreign investors including Chinese companies in an open, fair and non-discriminatory manner, for it is these investors who created a number of local job opportunities and made contributions for India’s economy growth, Gao said.

This is the latest sign that the Indian government’s crackdown against Chinese firms is escalating. The Income Tax department warned in last December that Xiaomi and OPPO could face up to 10 billion rupees (US$135 million) penalty as the agency’s nation-wide raids these two leading Chinese mobile makers had remitted the royalty of more than 55 billion rupees (US$740 million) to their overseas parents, violating the regulatory mandate for transaction disclosure. In January, the authorities demanded Xiaomi to pay 6.53 billion rupees (US$87.8 million) for import duty evasion. Earlier this week, The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) was said to issue an order to block 54 Chinese apps, citing national security concerns, and brought the total banned apps originated from China to 321 since the two countries' border clash resulting in rising tensions in May 2020.