India’s antitrust commission, Competition Commission of India, is looking into accusations that Alphabet Inc’s unit Google abuses its popular Android mobile operating system to block its rivals, four sources with direct knowledge of the issue told Reuters.
As per the Reuters report The Competition Commission of India has for the past six months been reviewing a case comparable to one Google faced in Europe which LED to a fine of 4.34 billion euro Google has disputed this order.
The report further adds, Google executives have in the last few months met Indian antitrust officials at least once to discuss the complaint.
The Competition Commission, which a poor record of completing investigations, might further investigate the accusations against Google, or drop the charges in case it lacks merit.
Last year also Google was under the scanner of the Indian antitrust watchdog who had imposed a fine of 1.36 billion rupees ($19 million) on Google for “search bias” and abuse of its dominant position.
It had also reported that Google had put its commercial flight search function in a primary position on the search results page.As per Reuters, Google had appealed against that order, saying the ruling could cause it “irreparable” harm and reputational loss.
It may be recalled, European Commission had accused Google of abusing its market dominance since 2011 with practices like forcing producers to pre-install Google Search and its Chrome browser, together with its Google Play program store on Android devices.