Samsung Electronics, which is under suspicion of tariff evasion in India, has filed an appeal after receiving a decision from the Indian government to collect more than 800 billion won in taxes and impose a penalty surcharge.
On the 4th (local time), according to Reuters, Samsung Electronics recently submitted an appeal to the tariff and service tax tribunal in Mumbai, western India. It was reported that Samsung Electronics stated in the appeal that "items that were duty-free when imported by Indian conglomerates became subject to tariffs (for Samsung Electronics)."
Previously, in January, Indian tax authorities noted that "Samsung Electronics did not pay tariffs of 10% or 20% when importing major telecommunications devices," resulting in a decision to collect a total of 44.6 billion rupees (approximately 740 billion won) in unpaid tariffs and impose penalty surcharges. Additionally, a total penalty surcharge of $81 million (approximately 114 billion won) was imposed on seven executives of Samsung Electronics' Indian subsidiary.
The product in question is a small radio frequency circuit module called "remote radio head," which is a device that transmits signals in 4G mobile communication (5G) base stations.
From 2018 to 2021, Samsung Electronics imported $784 million (approximately 1.1 trillion won) worth of this device from Korea and Vietnam without paying tariffs. Samsung Electronics supplied the imported devices to Indian telecommunications giant Reliance Jio.
Samsung Electronics maintained that this device is a duty-free item that does not perform transmission and reception functions; however, Indian authorities claimed it was a transmission and reception device subject to tariffs and collected the tariff. In response, Samsung Electronics pointed out that Reliance Jio had imported the same item duty-free for about three years until 2017.
Samsung Electronics noted, "There has been a long-standing practice of keeping this item duty-free, and the Indian tax authorities were fully aware of Reliance Jio's business practices."