Tax authorities in India are investigating under-invoicing of goods imported from China after the trade data highlighted a glaring difference of around $12 billion in the data sourced from China and India, the Economic Times reported.

On comparison, the trade data from the two countries show invoiced imports into the country are far less than exports from China to India. Taking cognizance of the same, the customs authorities have issued tax-evasion notices to 32 importers since September. Tax authorities suspect a tax evasion of more than Rs 16,000 crore through under-invoicing by businesses from April 2019 to December 2020. And more such notices are likely to be issued by the tax authorities in the coming days, the report said.

In a 2019 report, a US-based think tank Global Financial Integrity said that India lost a staggering $13 billion, over Rs 90,000 crore, to trade mis-invoicing and it said most of it relate to imports from China.