{"id":875045,"date":"2026-10-08T10:54:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-08T10:54:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/875045\/"},"modified":"2026-10-08T10:54:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T10:54:09","slug":"india-defends-satellite-internet-approval-process-after-elon-musk-jab-technology-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/875045\/","title":{"rendered":"India defends satellite internet approval process after Elon Musk jab | Technology News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Musk has claimed unnamed entities are blocking Starlink\u2019s launch to maintain their monopoly.<\/p>\n

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Published On 8 Oct 20268 Oct 2026<\/p>\n

India has refuted billionaire Elon Musk\u2019s claim that \u201ccertain oligarchs\u201d are blocking the launch of his Starlink satellite communication services in the country.<\/p>\n

Musk said in an X post on Wednesday that Starlink was being blocked so that unnamed individuals can \u201cmaintain their monopolistic chokehold on the Indian people\u201d, adding that it was a \u201ccrime against the people of India\u201d.<\/p>\n

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But India\u2019s Ministry of Communications defended its satellite internet approval process as being fair and non-discriminatory in a statement on Thursday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe suggestion that the framework or its application is unfair or discriminatory is baseless and misconceived,\u201d the ministry said without naming Starlink or Musk.<\/p>\n

It added that three different entities were at broadly the same regulatory stage and that all were undergoing security assessments.<\/p>\n

India\u2019s telecommunications sector is dominated by Reliance Jio, owned by billionaire Mukesh Ambani, and Bharti Airtel, owned by Sunil Mittal.<\/p>\n

Both have also ventured into satellite internet. While they have secured early approvals to launch, they are still awaiting final clearances.<\/p>\n

Musk has previously had run-ins with Ambani and Mittal over how India should grant them spectrum access. Last year, the two agreed to distribute Starlink systems alongside theirs, but the cooperation appears to have soured.<\/p>\n

Starlink has waited since 2022 for licences to operate commercially in India. Last year, it received a key licence from the Communications Ministry to launch, as well as a go-ahead from India\u2019s space agency.<\/p>\n

Concerns over security have mounted since 2024 after authorities said they found Starlink devices in a drug seizure operation in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, as well as in another army operation in Manipur state.<\/p>\n

At the time, Musk alleged Starlink\u2019s satellite beams were thereafter \u201cturned off over India\u201d and that they were \u201cnever on in the first place\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Musk has claimed unnamed entities are blocking Starlink\u2019s launch to maintain their monopoly. Published On 8 Oct 20268…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":875046,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[3995,4868,11,2344,174,3,6382,9107,79,193,74,11719],"class_list":["post-875045","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-asia","tag-business-and-economy","tag-elon-musk","tag-india","tag-internet","tag-news","tag-news-analysis","tag-regulation","tag-science","tag-space","tag-technology","tag-telecommunications"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/875045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=875045"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/875045\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/875046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=875045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=875045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=875045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}