India on Tuesday banned 43 mostly Chinese mobile apps including Alibaba Group Holding Ltd's e-commerce app Aliexpress. A few dating apps were also added on the list, as India's technology ministry cited them in a statement as threatening the country's "sovereignty and integrity".

A woman uses her phone to scan a purse inside the AliExpress pop-up store in Paris, France, September 24, 2020. /CFP

India has issued bans on around 200 apps this year, claiming that they could pose a threat to the state.

It banned 59 mostly Chinese mobile apps including Bytedance's TikTok and Tencent's WeChat following a border crisis that erupted between the two countries in June, before moving to ban another 47 apps in July and over 100 Chinese mobile apps, including wildly popular mobile game PUBG, in September.

India's ban against Chinese apps not only damages the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese investors and service providers, but also harms the interests of Indian consumers and the investment environment of India as an open economy, said Chinese Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) following the September ban.

The ministry added that India has abused the concept of "national security" and adopted discriminatory restrictive measures against Chinese companies, which violated World Trade Organization rules.

China serves as India's biggest source of imports. Official data show that in 2019, the bilateral trade volume between China and India reached 639 billion yuan ($97 billion), of which India imported 515 billion yuan ($78 billion) from China, accounting for two-thirds of the total trade between the two countries.