India says Starlink, Jio and OneWeb are at the same regulatory stage. Jio and Airtel signed deals to sell Starlink in 2025.
Elon Musk says Starlink is "being blocked by certain oligarchs in order to maintain their monopolistic chokehold on the Indian people." In an Oct. 7 post on X, he told followers they "can guess who they are" and called it "a crime against the people of India." He named no one and offered no evidence.
India's Ministry of Communications answered within a day. It called the claim "baseless and misconceived," said its rules are "fair and non-discriminatory," and said the three licensed satellite operators, identified in reports as Starlink, Jio Satellite Communications and OneWeb India, are at "broadly the same regulatory stage." All three are undergoing security assessments. Jio's unit and OneWeb, which is backed by the Bharti group, are Starlink's direct competitors for satellite service.
Reporting on the approval process points to three open items. Security assessments are under way for all three licensees, and that comes before any of them can seek spectrum. Starlink's foreign investment proposal was still pending in May, with officials raising questions about the company's structure, and as of Oct. 8 that approval remained among the clearances awaited. And a 5 percent charge on adjusted gross revenue, with a 4 percent rate for rural and remote areas, cleared the Digital Communications Commission in September but was still awaiting Union Cabinet approval as of Oct. 8.
The same stage does not necessarily mean the same conditions. A June report citing unnamed sources said officials worry that Starlink's laser links between satellites could route Indian users' data outside domestic infrastructure, and that Jio-SES and OneWeb do not use them. The report said officials may instead require that Indian users' data pass only through domestic gateways. Starlink says it has 20 gateway sites and hundreds of antennas in India and is "standing ready to serve India."
Then there are Jio and Airtel. In March 2025, they each signed agreements with SpaceX to bring Starlink to India. Jio said it would sell Starlink equipment through its stores, "subject to SpaceX receiving its own authorisations." Both also back their own satellite ventures: Jio is working with SES, and Airtel is a major backer of OneWeb. On spectrum, Jio argued for an auction, which could have made Starlink's entry more expensive, and India instead chose the administrative allocation Starlink preferred.
Jio has not answered Musk directly. At India Mobile Congress, Akash Ambani said Jio wants to "be heads down and deliver value to our Indian consumers." None of the reports reviewed for this article cites evidence that any company asked regulators to block Starlink.
Musk's post was a reply to an X account that said 11,256 Indian villages lacked 4G coverage as of May 2026. Those figures have not been independently confirmed. The coverage gap is worth arguing about, and so is the fiber side of it. In a written reply to the Lok Sabha, the government said 221,000 village councils were "service-ready" under its BharatNet fiber program as of June, and that connection points were operational at 80,472. Open magazine puts the total at roughly 264,000 village councils and reports that a parliamentary committee called the network's use "sub-optimal." "Service-ready" and "operational" are different measures.
Satellite can reach places cable has not. Whether it is the answer or a stopgap until the fiber is built is the policy question under the argument, and it is one Musk's post did not raise.
Sources:
Elon Musk on X: post on Starlink and India (Oct. 7)
Forbes: Elon Musk Accuses Unnamed "Oligarchs" Of Blocking Starlink's India Launch (Oct. 7)
Forbes: "Baseless": Indian Government Rejects Musk's Claim (Oct. 8)
The Federal (PTI): Elon Musk alleges "oligarchs" blocking Starlink in India (Oct. 8)
TechCrunch: India rejects Elon Musk's claim of discrimination over Starlink launch (Oct. 7)
Business Standard: Starlink's India entry, why the launch is stalled (Oct. 8)
Advanced Television: Starlink inches closer to India availability (Sept. 15)
Business Today: Akash Ambani says Jio is making "rapid progress" on satellite broadband (Oct. 8)
ANI: 2.21 lakh Gram Panchayats made service-ready under BharatNet (Aug. 5)
Open magazine: BharatNet has built the highway, but is rural India actually online (Aug. 9)
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