Open, capped, fast-track or closed? Ownership chart read honestly. If the case should not be filed as drawn, you hear it now, from us, in private.
India entry · China
Chinese Company Investing in India: The Approval Route, Explained
A Chinese company can still invest in India — but only with prior Indian government approval, obtained before the investment, never after it. Press Note 3 closed the automatic route to Chinese investors in 2020, and the much-reported relaxation of March 2026 was written for other countries' investors, not this one. What remains is a real, functioning approval process: applications are filed on the Foreign Investment Facilitation Portal, and approvals do come — 29 projects were cleared between March and August 2026, per Commerce Ministry figures reported at the time. ComplyKart is the Delhi team that builds these applications the way they are read: sector screen first, then the file.
The short answer: possible, conditional, slow by design. If your sector is open and your ownership is transparent, the question is not whether a route exists — it is whether your application is built well enough to walk it.
Approval applications prepared as a case file
Realistic timelines — 3 to 6 months, stated upfront
No workarounds sold — the law, applied properly
CAs, CSs and advocates on one team
The position, as of 2026
Can Chinese companies still invest in India?
Yes — through the government approval route only. Press Note 3 (17 April 2020) requires prior approval for any investment in India by an entity from a country sharing a land border with India, China included, and for any investment whose beneficial owner is from such a country. There is no minimum stake below which approval is unnecessary, and the investment cannot be made first and approved later.
Set the scale honestly, because it shapes how the system treats your file. China accounts for roughly 0.32% of India's cumulative FDI equity inflows — about US$2.51 billion across 25 years, 23rd among source countries (DPIIT figures, April 2000 to December 2025). This is a small, deliberately slowed corridor. Applications are read as security-and-policy documents first and commercial documents second. A file written like a sales pitch fails that reading; a file written like evidence passes it.
And the March 2026 development, since Chinese applicants ask about it constantly: Press Note 2 (2026) eased the rule for entities in non-border countries with land-border beneficial ownership of 10% or less and non-controlling, and added a fast track for certain manufacturing. DPIIT officials stated when announcing it that entities registered in China still require prior approval at any stake. Nothing in 2026 changed the Chinese applicant's road. It only made the contrast sharper.
The one faster lane
What is the 60-day fast track — and does your factory qualify?
Within the approval system, Press Note 2 (2026) created a 60-day fast-track decision for specified manufacturing: capital goods, electronic capital goods and components, polysilicon, and ingot-wafer production — where majority ownership and control of the Indian venture stay with resident Indians. It is a faster queue inside the approval route, not an escape from it.
Notice whose corridor this is: electronics, components and solar supply chains — precisely the industries Chinese manufacturers have been trying to bring to India since 2020. The design tells you the policy intent. India wants the factories and the technology; it wants them majority-owned and controlled on the Indian side; and it will decide in 60 days when a proposal arrives in that shape. If your plan is a Chinese-majority plant, the fast track is not yours and the standard approval queue is. If a resident-Indian-majority joint venture is genuinely acceptable to you — control shared for real, not on paper — the fast track is the most interesting opening in this corridor since 2020, and it is worth structuring the proposal around from the first conversation.
A line we do not cross
Can ownership be arranged to avoid the approval?
No — not legitimately. Press Note 3 reads through structures to the beneficial owner, so a nominee shareholder, a friendly third-country shell or a side agreement that hides Chinese ownership does not avoid the approval; it converts a lawful application into a FEMA violation with penalties and forced unwinding behind it. We prepare approval applications. We do not design routes around the rule, and you should distrust anyone who offers to.
This is worth saying on a page that wants your business, because the offers exist. The screening system was built in 2020 specifically against disguised entry, and its reviewers compare your application against banking trails, registry data and the Indian company's own filings for years afterwards. An approval obtained honestly is a durable asset — it survives audits, fundraises and exits. A structure built to hide is a liability that compounds. Choose the slower asset.
The process
From application to an operating Indian company
DPIIT's standard operating procedure (17 August 2023) works to an indicative 12-week decision target. Plan on three to six months in practice, longer for sensitive sectors.
Ownership to natural persons, source of funds, business plan, Chinese corporate records legalised and translated. Every document made to agree with every other.
Filed on the Foreign Investment Facilitation Portal; reviewed by DPIIT with the sector's administrative ministry and security screening in the loop. Queries answered from the same file, consistently.
With approval in hand: incorporate, open the bank account, remit capital, allot shares and file FC-GPR within 30 days. The Indian company's ordinary compliance life begins.
Before you spend on translations and legalisationLet us screen the sector and the ownership chart first. It is the cheapest stage to discover a problem, and the only stage where discovering one costs nothing.
The document trap
Can Chinese documents be apostilled for use in India?
Not for India. China joined the Hague Apostille Convention with effect from 7 November 2023 — but India formally objected to China's accession, so the Convention does not operate between the two countries. A Chinese apostille is therefore not valid for Indian filings. Mainland documents for India still travel the consular chain: notarisation in China, authentication by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs or a provincial foreign affairs office, then legalisation by the Indian Embassy or a Consulate in China.
Pages that tell you Chinese documents can now simply be apostilled for India are repeating the 2023 headline without the objection that followed it — check the HCCH status table and you will find India's objection recorded there. This matters in money: an applicant who apostilles a full corporate pack has bought the wrong legalisation and starts again. Run the consular chain once, correctly, with certified English translations prepared alongside, because Indian authorities work from the translation.
The mainland pack
Corporate records from the Chinese company, evidence behind the ownership, and the directors' personal documents — each carried through the consular chain with a certified English translation.
✓Business licence and articles of association of the Chinese company
✓Board or shareholder resolution approving the Indian investment
✓Shareholding chart to the ultimate beneficial owners, with identity documents
✓Source-of-funds evidence for the investment
✓Business plan for the Indian venture — activity, site, hiring, projections
✓Passports and address proofs of proposed directors
✓Certified English translations of every Chinese-language document
Hong Kong vehicle instead? If the investing entity is Hong Kong-registered, the paperwork differs — apostille at the High Court works there — but the Press Note 3 approval does not go away. Our Hong Kong page covers that case.
Sectors, stated plainly
Which sectors are closed, and which are read hardest?
Closed to all foreign investment, Chinese included: lottery, gambling and betting, chit funds, Nidhi companies, real-estate business outside permitted development, tobacco-product manufacturing, atomic energy and railway operations beyond the permitted exceptions (Consolidated FDI Policy). Read hardest inside an approval file: defence, telecom, media and brownfield pharmaceuticals — approval-based or capped for every foreigner, and layered on top of the Press Note 3 screen for a Chinese applicant.
Most genuine Chinese interest we see is none of the above. It is manufacturing and its supply chains — electronics assembly, components, capital goods, solar — plus the trading and after-sales operations that support them. Those sectors are open through approval, and the fast track exists for a slice of them. If that is your case, your application competes on the quality of its evidence: real premises, real hiring plans, real capital, ownership that matches the story. Bring the evidence and the corridor, narrow as it is, is navigable. This page is in English because the applicants who find us read globally; the conversation itself can start in writing, at whatever pace the time zones allow.
Keep reading
Guides Chinese investors use
The approval route and the document rules, in more depth.
FDI routes in India: automatic vs approval, explainedHow the approval route works across sectors — the system your application enters.Read →
Apostille for company registration documents in IndiaHow the apostille system works — and why mainland China is the exception Indian filings still make.Read →
Documents required for company registration in India for foreignersThe full foreign document pack, country by country.Read →
Subsidiary vs branch office vs liaison office in IndiaWhy an approval-route investor almost always needs the subsidiary form, not an office.Read →
Other corridors
Entering India from a different country?
The route into India changes with the investor's country — the FDI route, the treaty position and the document chain are all different. Pick the corridor that matches where you are investing from.
United StatesFull ownership in most sectors, the Delaware-parent question, and FC-GPR once shares are allotted.
United KingdomCETA has been in force since July 2026. What it changes for a UK firm setting up — and what it leaves alone.
SingaporeHoldco-over-opco structuring, the ACRA-side paperwork, and the treaty position after 2017.
United Arab EmiratesFree-zone and mainland founders, CEPA, and the MOFA-plus-embassy document chain the UAE requires.
Hong KongDoes Press Note 3 catch a Hong Kong holding company? Yes — here is how the approval route works.
ChinaThe government approval route under Press Note 3: the application, the document pack, the realistic timeline. You are on this page.
All foreign foundersThe main India-entry page: entity choices, costs, the full process and answers for every other country.
Straight answers
FAQs: investing in India from China
Yes, with prior government approval under Press Note 3. The approval comes first — before incorporation money, before share subscription, before any investment step. Approvals are being granted: 29 projects were cleared under the framework between March and August 2026, per Commerce Ministry figures. The route is narrow and slow, but it is a route.
Almost not at all, directly. Press Note 2 (2026) restored the automatic route for non-border-country entities with small, non-controlling land-border ownership, and built a 60-day fast track for specified manufacturing. DPIIT stated that entities registered in China still need approval at any stake. The fast track is the only part of the 2026 package a Chinese manufacturer can actually use.
The DPIIT standard operating procedure targets an indicative 12 weeks. Plan on three to six months; sensitive sectors run longer, fast-track manufacturing proposals are decided on a 60-day track when they meet the ownership conditions. The file's completeness is the variable you control — incomplete ownership or funds evidence is what stretches cases.
A faster decision lane inside the approval system, created by Press Note 2 (2026), for specified manufacturing: capital goods, electronic capital goods and components, polysilicon and ingot-wafer production. The condition is structural — majority ownership and control of the Indian venture must rest with resident Indians. A Chinese-majority plant does not qualify; a genuine resident-majority joint venture can.
No. China entered the Hague Apostille system on 7 November 2023, but India objected to China's accession, so the Convention does not operate between India and China. Documents for Indian use follow the consular chain: notarisation in China, authentication by the foreign affairs authorities, and legalisation by the Indian Embassy or a Consulate in China, with certified English translations.
The company's business licence and articles, the resolution approving the investment, a shareholding chart carried to the ultimate beneficial owners with their identity documents, source-of-funds evidence, and a business plan for the Indian venture. Directors' passports and address proofs follow for incorporation. Every document travels the consular legalisation chain with a certified English translation.
The investment cannot proceed in that form, and detailed reasons are not always given. A redesigned proposal — different sector shape, different ownership balance, stronger evidence — can be a new conversation, but there is no appeal that converts a refusal into an approval. This is why the screening conversation happens before filing: a case that should not be filed as drawn should not be filed at all.
Ready when you are
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Share your business activity, who will own the company and where you are based. We will map the entity, the document route from China, the filing sequence and the compliance that follows. You receive the scope and costs in writing before you pay.
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