By Aditya Kalra and Arpan Chaturvedi

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Google has filed a authorized problem in India’s Supreme Court docket to dam a ruling by the nation’s antitrust watchdog that can drive the U.S. firm to alter the way it markets its Android platform, courtroom data confirmed on Saturday.

The Competitors Fee of India (CCI) in October fined the Alphabet (NASDAQ:) Inc unit $161 million for exploiting its dominant place out there for Android, which powers 97% of smartphones in India and is a key development area for the U.S. big.

The problem comes after Google suffered a setback on Wednesday when an appeals tribunal rejected its request to dam the antitrust ruling. The corporate argued that implementation of the CCI’s directives will harm its long-standing enterprise mannequin and shopper pursuits.

Supreme Court docket data present Google filed a problem towards the tribunal ruling on Saturday. A listening to date is but to be mounted.

Reuters was first to report on Thursday about Google’s deliberate technique.

Sources earlier this week informed Reuters that Google considers a authorized problem as its final hope of blocking the ruling of the CCI, whose directives forcing the corporate to alter its enterprise mannequin kick in on Jan. 19.

Google’s Supreme Court docket submitting seeks to place the CCI decison on maintain whereas its attraction is heard, mentioned one particular person aware of the matter on Saturday.

Google has been involved concerning the Indian choice because the treatments ordered are seen as extra sweeping than the European Fee’s landmark 2018 ruling for imposing illegal restrictions on Android cellular system makers. Google has challenged the document $4.3 billion effective in that case.

A Google spokesperson didn’t instantly reply.

The CCI dominated in October that Google’s licensing of its Play Retailer “shall not be linked with the requirement of pre-installing” Google search providers, the Chrome browser, YouTube or another Google functions.