The Noida Police have lodged an FIR and launched investigation into allegations of illegal export of chips of used smartphones in the garb of scrap from India to China and Hong Kong, officials said on Monday.
The case allegedly pertains to fraud and evasion of tax as well as customs duty and is linked with a separate matter being investigated by the Special Task Force (STF) of Uttar Pradesh Police related to the arrest of Chinese nationals who were found living illegally in India last year.
Two Chinese nationals and a Noida-based company have been named as accused in the case lodged at the Sector 63 police station of the city on the complaint of a sub-inspector of the UP Police's STF.
The Chinese nationals named in the case have been identified as Liu Rui and Liu Yuan while the Noida-based company is Roshan Electronic, according to the FIR accessed by PTI.
The complainant in the FIR claimed that used mobile phone chips were being "exported in cargo boxes which showed them as scrap material and sent in free sample category under the non-commercial group".
"At least this firm alone must have exported goods worth Rs 2,000 crores, or 10,000-15,000 boxes and in each box, showing 15 to 50 kgs of goods as garbage, declaring them in the free sample category as non-commercial export," the complainant stated, adding that one kg comprises around 400 chips and in Indian terms, each chip is sold for Rs 3,000 to Rs 5,000 in markets of China and Hong Kong.
The STF official also suspected re-routing of money through Hawala back to India with "re-import of the same goods" by big mobile companies alleging "this is a very big international organised gang".
A senior UP Police officer told PTI that the STF had been probing this issue for over two months and now the registration of the FIR was recommended in this case.
The FIR has been lodged under the Indian Penal Code sections 419 (cheating by personation), 420 (cheating), 467, 468, 471 (all related to forgery), 201 (causing disappearance of evidence) and 120B (party to criminal conspiracy).
Charges under the Foreigners Act, 1946 have also been invoked in the case.
An officer of the Noida Police requesting anonymity said they have launched an investigation into the case.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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