India court orders TikTok maker ByteDance to deposit US$11 million in tax evasion case
- Tax authorities accuse Beijing-based ByteDance of suppressing transactions and claiming excessive tax credits
- The company still has an Indian workforce of more than 1,000 after the country banned its TikTok app
An Indian court on Tuesday said China’s ByteDance must deposit around US$11 million that authorities believe the company owes in an alleged case of tax evasion, a decision the government said bars the firm from using existing bank funds for other purposes.
An Indian tax intelligence agency in mid-March ordered HSBC and Citibank in Mumbai to freeze accounts of ByteDance India as it investigated some of the firm’s financial dealings. ByteDance challenged the move in court saying the freeze amounted to harassment and was done illegally.
ByteDance, owner of the TikTok video app, has said in court it does not owe the tax government is demanding and does not agree with the tax authority’s decision to freeze its accounts.
After a government counsel said ByteDance owed the authorities about 790 million rupees (US$11 million), the High Court in Mumbai said the company will need to keep that amount blocked in a state-run bank.
That amount will be frozen, the two-judge bench said.
However, the four blocked bank accounts of ByteDance held only US$10 million in funds, according to its court filing.
A counsel for the federal tax authority, Jitendra Mishra, told Reuters ByteDance can use the US$10 million for making the court mandated deposit, but cannot use it for any other activity. Effectively, Mishra said, the accounts remain frozen until the amount is moved to the state-run bank.