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Elon Musk has been posting on X in a tone that escalated from sarcasm to open accusation. He asked a question that set Indian public discourse alight: "Is Ambani the real boss of India?" He claimed Starlink has been licensed in more than 165 countries, spent five years complying with every Indian government law and requirement, and still cannot get final commercial approval. He pointed the finger at "certain oligarchs," accusing them of strangling competition through monopolistic tactics and calling it "a crime against the people of India."
The Ministry of Communications responded swiftly and firmly: the allegations are "baseless and conceptually flawed." The official statement noted that Starlink, Eutelsat OneWeb, and Jio Satellite Communications are all licensed parties at broadly the same stage of approval, all awaiting security clearance and spectrum allocation, and that no discrimination exists.
Musk was not buying it. He posted further, naming Mukesh Ambani directly, mocking Asia's richest man with the title "Prime Minister Ambani," and demanding to know whether he would allow Starlink to compete. Ambani's side offered no formal response. Reliance Jio chairman Akash Ambani, asked about the matter at the India Mobile Congress, declined to comment, saying only that Jio is focused on creating value for consumers.
There is a detail Musk's supporters conveniently ignore: Starlink signed distribution agreements with Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel back in March 2025. In other words, Ambani's company was supposed to be one of Starlink's sales channels in India. If Starlink is kept outside the door, Jio loses that distribution revenue too. This is far from a simple story of "a monopolist blocking competition."
What is actually holding Starlink back is security. In 2024, Indian authorities seized Starlink equipment during a drug-smuggling investigation in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, and similar terminals turned up during military operations in Manipur. For a country highly sensitive about foreign satellite networks crossing its borders and data potentially flowing abroad, those discoveries were enough to stretch the approval process indefinitely. Anndy Lian, a Singapore-based technology policy consultant, offered a sharp observation to SCMP: "These regional delays are not roadblocks to innovation but standard sovereign prerogatives."
The timing of Musk's October offensive is telling. In the same month, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrived in India.
The itinerary itself was a signal. Rubio did not go to Delhi first to shake hands with Modi. He flew directly to Jamnagar in Gujarat to tour Reliance Industries' sprawling refinery complex—the largest in the world—and meet Mukesh Ambani. The New York Times described the visit as "commercial diplomacy," but bypassing the capital for a business hub sends a message in diplomatic protocol that goes well beyond the word "commercial."
US-India relations are in a delicate stalemate. The Trump administration had earlier imposed tariffs of up to 50 percent on Indian goods, half of it tied to India's purchases of Russian oil. An interim agreement later brought the rate down to 18 percent, but a full trade deal remains unsigned. Before departing, Rubio said "we want to sell them as much energy as we possibly can"—blunt to the point of rudeness. And just before his visit, Trump paused sanctions on countries buying Russian oil, read in New Delhi as giving the Modi government a face-saving exit.
The pressure runs both ways. Washington wants India to reduce its reliance on Russian energy, buy more American oil and gas, and align on supply chains to counter China. India wants tariff exemptions, technology access, and the practical benefits of continuing to buy discounted Russian crude. An analysis by China.com noted that India has been relatively "restrained" in the face of US pressure, refraining from reciprocal countermeasures—an attitude that has drawn criticism at home. A Pew Research Center survey from August 2026 found that 50 percent of American respondents held an unfavorable view of India.
It was precisely at this juncture that a photograph stirred India's domestic politics.
A dataset of Epstein files released by the US Department of Justice included an image of Indian Petroleum Minister Hardeep Singh Puri seated face-to-face at a table with Jeffrey Epstein. No one else appears in the frame. Puri had said at a February press conference that his meetings with Epstein took place as part of a delegation from an international peace institute, "three or maybe at most four times," all of a working nature. But the photograph shows a one-on-one setting.
The opposition seized the moment immediately. Congress's Srinivas wrote on X: "Yesterday the US Secretary of State landed in 'Bombay,' and at that very moment, the photo of Hardeep 'Epstein' Puri surfaced from the US Justice Department files. Will there be some video too, to resolve the technical issues of the US trade deal?" Rahul Gandhi had earlier linked the timing of the Rubio-Ambani meeting to the release of the Puri-Epstein image. Puri's office responded that the minister cannot recall exactly which meeting the photograph is from, but insisted "these were working meetings, conducted at a table, with notes and papers, in a professional setting and attire."
Taken together, the picture facing the Modi government is this: Musk is publicly humiliating India's most powerful businessman, and that businessman's refinery is precisely the destination of Rubio's visit. Washington is pressing hard on trade and energy, while the opposition uses the Epstein photograph to convert diplomatic pressure into domestic political ammunition. The Starlink approval impasse looks like a regulatory matter on the surface, but it is embedded in US-India bargaining, India's security anxieties, and the complex tug-of-war between domestic oligarchs and foreign capital.
Is India negotiating on its own terms? Judging by the communications ministry holding its ground against Musk's public pressure campaign and insisting on security review, yes. Judging by Rubio bypassing Delhi to meet Ambani first, Washington clearly believes going straight to business power brokers is more efficient than going through the Prime Minister's Office. Whether this "Jamnagar diplomacy" works better than the "Modi-Trump bromance" is a question whose answer lies not in New Delhi, but in Washington and Silicon Valley's next moves.
One thing is certain: Starlink's fate in India is no longer just a company's licensing problem
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