New Delhi has reacted strongly to Google delisting several well-known and popular Indian apps from The Play Store, on Saturday.
IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said the developers from the tech giant and the affected firms and companies have been summoned for a meeting next week, while adding that such measures by Google cannot be permitted.
The IT minister told that the startup ecosystem is key to the Indian economy and their fate cannot be left to any big tech to decide, as this will create a monopoly in the industry.
India will protect these Indian apps, says Minister
“India is very clear, our policy is very clear … our startups will get the protection that they need,” Vaishnaw said, adding that the government will be meeting Google and app developers who have been delisted, next week, to resolve the dispute.
“I have already called Google … I have already called the app developers who have been delisted, we will be meeting them next week. This cannot be permitted … This kind of delisting cannot be permitted,” Vaishnaw said.
Stating that India has built a strong startup ecosystem of over one lakh startups, and more than 100 unicorns from scratch in a matter of 10 years, the minister said the energy of youth and entrepreneurs must be channelised fully and
“cannot be left to the policies of any big tech company.”
“Today, we have more than 1,00,000 startups, more than 100 unicorns … the energy of our youth, the energy of our entrepreneurs, energy of our talented people that has to be channelised fully well, it cannot be left to the policies of any big tech,” Vaishnaw added.
On Friday, Google stated that 10 companies in the country, including “many well-established” ones had avoided paying fees despite benefiting from the platform and Play Store, and proceeded to delist some apps, which was previously reported on this platform.
The raging dispute is over now that Google is imposing a fee of 11%-26% on in-app payments after the anti-competition body the CCI ordered the scrapping of a previous system of charging 15%-30%.
Google went ahead to remove the apps not paying the fee after the Supreme Court did not provide interim relief to companies behind these apps.
