Importing From China to India: Customs, BIS and IEC in 2026

In 2025, India imported 149.49 billion US dollars worth of Chinese goods according to the United Nations Comtrade database, dominated by five categories accounting for about 76% of the total: electrical and electronic equipment (56.98 billion dollars), machinery, nuclear reactors and boilers (31.51 billion), organic chemicals (11.51 billion), plastics (6.83 billion), pearls, precious stones and metals (5.14 billion). Optical instruments, vehicles and iron or steel articles follow.

These figures point to concrete niches: electronic components for local assembly, industrial machinery, chemical and plastic inputs, but also consumer goods such as textiles, furniture and toys, which move through the same ports as industrial flows.

As of 27 September 2026, we found no bilateral free trade agreement in force between India and China, and India has not joined the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), which could have covered both countries. Chinese goods therefore enter India under the most favoured nation tariff regime.

According to the World Bank's World Integrated Trade Solution database, for 2023, the latest year available, India's trade weighted average applied tariff, across all origins, stands at 5.22%, and the simple average tariff, across all products, at 9.81%. These averages do not replace the exact rate for a specific tariff line, which must be checked with the CBIC item by item.

The Customs Act 1962 governs import duties and sets the rules for customs value, under the authority of the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC). The bill is built from several components applied in cascade on the customs value, generally the CIF value: basic customs duty, whose rate depends on the product's tariff heading under the Customs Tariff Act 1975, a social welfare surcharge calculated on this basic duty, then the integrated tax on goods and services, IGST, calculated on the customs value plus the basic duty and the surcharge. India does not belong to any customs union and therefore does not apply a common external tariff shared with other countries.

The exact rate of the surcharge and the IGST depends on the product code and must be checked with the CBIC; this three-tier structure was in force as of 27 September 2026. As an illustration, a customs value of 10,000 dollars would carry roughly 522 dollars of basic duty if using the 5.22% trade weighted average applied tariff recorded by the World Bank for 2023; the surcharge and the IGST are then added on a broader base, and cannot be estimated without the exact tariff heading.

The Import Export Code, or IEC, is a business identifier issued by the Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT): no one can import or export in India without this number. Since the goods and services tax reform, the IEC is now the same as the company's Permanent Account Number, the PAN.

The Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), the national standards body created by the BIS Act 2016, administers mandatory certification through Quality Control Orders, which cover a growing number of product categories, particularly electronics and IT equipment. The list evolves through successive orders, with updates tracked on the BIS website through 2026: it must be checked product by product before confirming an order, and certification generally has to be obtained by the manufacturer itself.

The precise cost and timeline of BIS certification could not be confirmed from a public source at the time of writing: they depend on the product and the recognised laboratory, and should be checked with the BIS or its dedicated portal.

The DGFT classifies goods as freely importable, restricted, prohibited or canalised through designated agencies, a classification that must be checked product by product before placing an order; the precise list could not be reconstructed in detail.

Beyond this classification, the Directorate General of Trade Remedies (DGTR) conducts antidumping investigations that frequently target Chinese goods: as of 27 September 2026, the DGTR's list of ongoing investigations cites China, for example, for T-shaped elevator guide rails, amoxicillin trihydrate, glycine, thermal paper and hot-rolled flat steel products. An antidumping duty, where it exists, is added on top of the customs duty and the IGST: whether it applies to a given tariff heading must be checked with the DGTR before ordering, and an aggregate figure for measures currently in force against China could not be confirmed from a public source.

Jawaharlal Nehru Port, at Nhava Sheva near Mumbai, commissioned in 1989, handles about half of the combined container traffic of India's major ports and ranks twenty-second among the world's top hundred container ports. Mundra Port, in Gujarat, the country's leading commercial port, offers a combined capacity of 7.5 million TEU across its four container terminals, served by more than thirty-five regular shipping lines.

From South China, cargo most often leaves Guangzhou, Shenzhen or Yantian for Nhava Sheva or Mundra; transit times could not be confirmed from an official source and should be requested from the freight forwarder. FOB South China works when the buyer arranges transport directly; CIF or CFR to the chosen port when an intermediary handles it. DDP remains inadvisable unless the Chinese seller is itself liable for goods and services tax in India, which remains rare. On payment, the common practice is a deposit at order confirmation followed by a balance before shipment, paid into the Chinese company's business account, never a personal account, with any change of bank details verified by a direct phone call.

A first import follows a precise sequence: obtaining the IEC, a written specification sheet, factory verification, an approved sample, a proforma invoice with an Incoterm, checking for any applicable BIS certification or antidumping duty before starting production, pre-shipment inspection, freight to the chosen Indian port, then filing the Bill of Entry and customs clearance by the Indian importer or its local broker.

Sorva is a sourcing and trading house based in Guangzhou, in the Tianhe district, backed by a Chinese subsidiary and a French parent company. Our Chinese-speaking team finds and verifies factories, arranges visits and samples, negotiates terms, has quality checked before loading and arranges freight to the chosen Indian port. We never act as the official importer in India and do not clear customs in the destination country. Our base offer is billed in US dollars, with region-specific options quoted on request.