The world’s richest man is publicly fighting India’s richest man. Elon Musk wants to bring Starlink — his satellite internet service — to India. He says Starlink has followed every Indian rule for five years and still can’t start selling. This week, the fight turned personal. Below is what happened, in order, with what both sides actually said.
Short answer: Starlink has a satellite licence in India but can’t launch yet because it still needs security clearance and spectrum. Musk blames Mukesh Ambani’s influence. The government says all three licenced players — Starlink, Jio Satcom, and Eutelsat OneWeb — are stuck at the same stage. Musk has shown no evidence Ambani is personally blocking anything.
What Musk said, day by day
On Thursday, October 8, Musk posted on X: “Starlink is licensed in over 165 countries and has spent five years complying with every single law and requirement of the government of India, so why still no license? Is Ambani the real boss of India?” (as reported by Reuters, October 9).
The next evening he went further. “Dear Prime Minister Ambani, Please accept my humble apologies for not realising that you are the real boss of India. Naturally, you would prefer to maintain your monopolistic exploitation of the great people of India, but would you nonetheless consider allowing Starlink to compete?” (The Hindu, October 9).
Musk also made a softer pitch. He said many parts of India have no internet at all, which keeps children from studying and small businesses from selling to the world. “Starlink would change their lives for the better,” he wrote. He added that Starlink has saved lives during natural disasters around the world “when all other communication systems have failed” (The Hindu, October 9).
On Saturday, October 10, Musk shared screenshots of two old reports: a 2022 Al Jazeera investigation titled “How a Reliance-funded firm boosts BJP’s campaigns on Facebook,” and a 2024 Indian Express report saying Qwik Supply — a company linked to Reliance — donated Rs 385 crore to the BJP and Rs 25 crore to the Shiv Sena through electoral bonds. Reliance has not responded to any of this (Rediff, October 10).
What the government said
Communications Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia answered Musk at a briefing during the India Mobile Congress in Delhi on October 9. “India does not allow a monopoly in any sector,” he said (Reuters, October 9).
Scindia said the government is “technology agnostic” — it doesn’t pick winners. “It is for the customer to choose in a free market which service he or she prefers,” he said (The Hindu, October 9).
His main point: three companies already hold satellite licences — Starlink, Reliance Jio’s Jio Satcom, and Bharti-backed Eutelsat OneWeb. All three, he said, are at “broadly the same regulatory stage.” Each one must clear security conditions, and spectrum will be assigned once the pricing is decided. The government called suggestions of an unfair process “baseless and misconceived” (Reuters, October 9). Amazon’s Kuiper has also shown interest and will go through the same process. The telecom regulator TRAI and the telecom department are close to a final decision on how satcom spectrum will be priced (The Hindu, October 9).
What these words actually mean
A few terms keep coming up. Here is what they mean in plain words.
Satcom licence: a permission slip to run an internet service through satellites in space, instead of mobile towers on the ground. Starlink has the slip. But a slip alone doesn’t let you open shop.
Security clearance: the government checks that the service can’t be misused — that data stays safe and the company follows Indian rules. All three players must pass this.
Spectrum: think of it as invisible roads in the sky that signals travel on. Without a road assigned to you, your satellites can’t reach customers. Nobody has their road yet, because the government hasn’t fixed the price.
The backstory most people missed
This fight didn’t start this week. Starlink first applied for an Indian licence in 2021 and even started taking pre-orders from Indian customers. The government told it to stop until it had permission.
Then came a bigger battle. In 2024, Ambani wanted satellite spectrum auctioned — sold to the highest bidder, like mobile airwaves. Auctions favour the deepest pockets. Musk wanted it assigned administratively — given out at a set price, the way most countries do it. India chose administrative allocation. Musk won that round.
This week’s row is round two. The question now is not who gets spectrum, but when — and at what price, and who clears the security checks first.
The prize is big. India has more than a billion internet users, in a market where Ambani’s Reliance Jio and Sunil Mittal’s Bharti Airtel dominate mobile networks (Reuters, October 9). Whoever sells satellite internet here first gets a head start on the villages and towns that mobile towers never reached.
What nobody can prove yet
One important fact: Musk has not shown any evidence that Ambani personally blocked Starlink’s licence. Reuters noted this directly in its October 9 report. Reliance Jio did not answer Reuters’ request for comment.
The donation reports Musk shared are real, published articles. But they are about political funding — they don’t prove a link to the licence delay.
Others have jumped in. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi exchanged posts with Musk on X, and Scindia mocked the Congress for first opposing Starlink’s licence and now supporting it (The Hindu, October 9). Actor and Rajya Sabha MP Kamal Haasan hit back at Musk, saying India is “no colony” and no billionaire should dictate a country’s policies (The Shillong Times, October 11).
What happens next
TRAI and the telecom department are close to deciding how satcom spectrum will be priced. Once that decision lands, spectrum goes to the three licence-holders as each one clears its security conditions. That’s the honest timeline — no shortcuts, no favouritism promised.
And one fact to keep in mind: Starlink runs in more than 165 countries today. India, with over a billion internet users, is still “coming soon” on that map.
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