Surveys At BBC Office: No Convincing Response, Says India Govt Advisor

New Delhi: Teams from Income Tax department conducted surveys at BBC offices in the national Capital and Mumbai for the second straight day.

According to Kanchan Gupta, Senior Advisor at Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, the BBC did not provide a “convincing response” to Indian tax authorities in the past.

The ongoing survey was connected to transfer pricing rules and diversion of profits, the senior Indian government official told Times Now on Wednesday.

Many, including Opposition parties, are saying that the government’s action is a tit-for-tat against BBC’s negative two-part documentary against PM Narendra Modi, questioning the then-Gujarat CM’s role in the 2002 Godhra riots.

However, Gupta said the income tax survey was not vindictive or “done out of a sense of pique”.

BBC informed its employees in an internal note on Wednesday that India are looking into questions about the broadcaster’s structure, activities and tax status.