Musk asks if Ambani is 'the real boss of India' as Starlink's launch stays stalled

Elon Musk has openly questioned whether Mukesh Ambani, chair of Reliance Industries, holds outsized power over Indian policy, escalating a public fight over why SpaceX's Starlink still cannot launch commercial satellite internet service in one of the world's largest connectivity markets.

According to TechCrunch, Musk first accused unnamed "oligarchs" of working to keep Starlink out of India in order to protect what he characterized as their dominance over the market. He provided no evidence and named no one, but framed the alleged obstruction as a betrayal of ordinary Indians who still lack affordable broadband.

New Delhi pushes back

India's Ministry of Communications rejected the implication within hours. In a statement reported by TechCrunch, the ministry described its satellite communications rules as fair and applied uniformly, and noted that Starlink sits at roughly the same point in the approval pipeline as the two other licensed satellite operators in the country. All three, the ministry said, are still undergoing security evaluations that must be completed before they can apply for spectrum, the radio frequencies satellites depend on to deliver service.

Musk's follow-up post naming Ambani came the next day. Asking on X whether Ambani is effectively running the country, Musk argued that Starlink has spent years meeting India's regulatory demands and questioned why it still has no license to operate.

Five years and counting

Starlink first attempted to enter India in 2021 and had to refund equipment preorders in early 2022 after regulators objected to it selling the service before securing the necessary permissions, TechCrunch notes. Since then the company has made substantial progress on paper: it has obtained key regulatory approvals, signed distribution partnerships with Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel last year, and built a local operation led by former Payoneer executive Prabhakar Jayakumar, appointed in December.

A launch date, however, remains unset. Starlink says it has already deployed more than 20 gateway sites, the ground stations that link its satellites to the wider internet, along with hundreds of antennas across India, and has adapted its operations to meet the country's rules on security and data sovereignty. The company also presents its network as a supplement to India's terrestrial mobile networks rather than a substitute for them.

Musk's initial comments came just hours after Lauren Dreyer, Starlink's vice president of business operations, appeared at the India Mobile Congress conference in New Delhi, where she reiterated the company's commitment to the market and said it stands ready to serve the country and support Prime Minister Narendra Modi's goal of universal connectivity.

The spectrum fight behind the feud

The friction with Ambani's business empire predates this week's exchange. Starlink had argued that India should assign satellite spectrum administratively rather than auction it, while Reliance Jio pushed for an auction, an approach that would have raised Starlink's cost of entry. India ultimately sided with Starlink's preferred method and chose administrative allocation.

Even so, Starlink's two distribution partners are also its rivals. Jio is developing satellite broadband with operator SES, and Airtel is a major backer of Eutelsat OneWeb, another licensed satellite operator currently awaiting the same security clearances.

While India remains out of reach, Starlink this week introduced Starlink Mobile, its direct-to-phone service, in neighbouring Bangladesh. TechCrunch reports that Starlink, the communications ministry, Jio and Airtel did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Why it matters

India counts more than a billion internet subscribers, making it one of the most valuable markets any satellite operator could enter, and connectivity gaps in rural areas are exactly the gap Starlink's service is built to address. The dispute also puts two of the world's most powerful businessmen, who are simultaneously business partners through Jio's distribution deal, in direct public conflict, and tests whether India's regulatory process can remain insulated from that pressure. How the security reviews and spectrum assignment play out will set a precedent for how foreign satellite operators are treated in India, and whether consumers there get another meaningful broadband option.