Elon’s Big Starlink Win in India: How Musk Overcame Ambani, Airtel, Regulators

Elon Musk’s Starlink is finally entering India, partnering with telecom giants Bharti Airtel and Jio Platforms after years of battles. This report dives into the dramatic saga: Musk’s initial struggles to bring satellite internet to India in 2021, fierce opposition from Mukesh Ambani’s Jio and Airtel’s Sunil Mittal — who pushed their own satellite plans like Jio SpaceFiber and OneWeb — and a tangled regulatory landscape. The Telecom Act of 2023 shifted the game, favouring Musk’s spectrum allocation stance over auctions, despite telecom giants’ protests. What turned the tide? A key February 2025 meeting between PM Narendra Modi and Musk, plus Donald Trump’s White House return—a Musk ally—seemed to fast-track approvals. Now, Airtel and Jio, once rivals, are teaming up with Starlink—announced March 11-12, 2025—to roll out high-speed internet to India’s remotest corners. But will this truce spark a broadband revolution or a pricing war?