Battlegrounds Mobile India was surprisingly removed from the Google Play Store yesterday and even from the Apple App Store. The game’s developer Krafton had launched the game exclusively for India to get around the restrictions that had been put in place by the local government to ban Chinese apps. The predecessor, PUBG was banned because of this reason
PUBG was banned along with a hundred similar apps due to its ties to China:
Battlegrounds Mobile India was launched to be the Indian version of PUBG, Krafton complied with all directives set forth by the Government of India in order to make the game available in the Indian market as its user base in the sub-continent is huge. The GoI had previously cited National Security as the reason to ban PUBG.
This time even the India-exclusive version seems to have disappeared and for no apparent reason. Google released an official statement that had previously stated, “On receipt of the order, following established process, we have notified the affected developer and blocked access to the app that remained available on the Play Store in India.”
The latest report courtesy of MySmartPrice reached out to Krafton with respect to the current situation. The company responded by releasing this statement, “We are clarifying how BGMI was removed from Google Play and will let you know once we get specific information,” The reason for the game’s removal seems to be a mystery but Reuters claims that the game was removed as it violated Section 69A of IT Law.
Krafton pleads innocence:
The game’s developers have attempted to resolve this issue but to no success as of yet. New information that surfaced now indicates that the developer met up with the Government officials to talk about the ban. Krafton has presented its perspective to the government and has been transparent with respect to the independence of its operations and other data from Chinese influence.
In addition to this, the company expressed that it handles all data and other privacy-related matters with the most responsibility. The new evidence presented helps Krafton’s case as if proven to be authentic then the existing removal of the game from all platforms will be held unreasonable.
Tencent, the Chinese company owns nearly 15% of Krafton, the former is the original make of PUBG. For now all we can do is wait and watch.
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