SunstarTV Bureau: TikTok, WeChat, and a total of 59 apps from Chinese companies have been permanently banned in India by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY).
Earlier, these apps were banned by the government in June 2020, and now, reports quoting sources say that the ban for these apps is permanent.
In an earlier conversation, sources had told Gadgets 360 that following the ban, the government had asked for responses from all the companies that were banned about the data being collected, and how it was used. It appears that the government was not satisfied with the response, and issued a notice last week, according to reports.
This does not bode well for the other apps which were banned over the course of 2020 over 200 by the end of the year. Some, such as the hugely popular smartphone game PUBG Mobile had attempted to remedy the situation by launching a new, India-only version, PUBG Mobile India which was announced in November, after hiring new staff in India. However, later responses to RTIs showed that MeitY had given no permission to the relaunch.
With this latest development, it looks unlikely that the game will be making a comeback in India very soon. It’s also unclear what this announcement means got the hundreds of people employed by TikTok in India, sources had told Gadgets 360 that the team in India was retained after the ban, and was participating in global operations.
