The government of Henglan Village has been caught hiding important data and submitting false information to the National Bureau of Statistics, according to the Zhongshan Municipal Government Information Office. Those responsible were forced to resign on Sunday, XKB reports. The issue is being investigated.

The village is guilty of four violations: the network reporting company issued false information; local enterprises fabricated their data; industrial statistics were misrepresented by up to 6.3 billion yuan; and senior officials in the village were guilty of negligence.

Economists have been speculating for years as to whether China is cooking the books. CNN Money has this to say:

Pose this question to a group a China watchers and you’re likely to receive a variety of responses. Some observers are convinced that China is cooking its books. Others believe state statistics are largely reliable and useful for drawing conclusions about the world’s second largest economy. Still others will debate the accuracy of certain data classes, pointing to more meaningful alternatives.

The article ends by leaning towards the suggestion that official data coming out of China is mostly legit.

This particular instance of cooking the books has been dealt with, and that at least must be a good sign.