The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday conducted searches at 44 locations across the country in a money laundering investigation against Chinese smartphone manufacturing company Vivo and related companies, citing officials, the PTI reported.
The searches are being carried out under sections of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
The agency is conducting searches at 44 places related to Vivo and associated companies, they said.
According to sources, part from Vivo, premises of a few other Chinese companies were being raided by the ED officials.
Vivo has not given any official statement regarding the searches by ED.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has also been probing the case and have lodged a separate FIR.
In another case, on April 30 ED had seized Rs 5,551.27 crore from Xiaomi India in connection with illegal outward remittances made by the company. The seizure was made from the company's bank accounts under provisions of the Foreign Exchange Management Act.
In February this year, Chinese telecom major Huawei has been accused of tax evasion by the income tax (I-T) department by manipulating its account books in India.
An investigation has found that the Chinese telecom firm manipulated account books to reduce its taxable income. The search and seizure operations by the I-T department were conducted on February 15, 2022, with the probe still in progress.
The CBDT has made multiple charges against the company, including that it “made inflated payments against receipt of technical services from its related parties outside India. The assessee firm could not justify the genuineness of obtaining of such alleged technical services in lieu of which payment has been made as also the basis of determination of consideration for the same. The expenses debited by the assessee company towards receipt of such services are to the tune of Rs 129 crore over a period of five years,” it said.