The Internet and Mobile Association of India, an influential tech industry association, has appointed Dream Sports co-founder and CEO Harsh Jain as the association’s new chairman, bucking the tradition of giving the top positions to Big Tech executives after they many Indian startups have been criticized by critics.
Rajesh Magow, Co-Founder and Group Chief Executive of MakeMyTrip, will now serve as Vice Chairman of IAMAI, while Times Internet’s Satyan Gajwani has been appointed Treasurer of the industry association. Magow takes over the role previously held by Meta’s Shivnath Thukral, while Jain succeeds Google India boss Sanjay Gupta.
The appointments are the result of an internal election after numerous leading Indian entrepreneurs claimed that IAMAI had lost credibility over its positions on the regulations and policies being drafted in New Delhi.
Shaadi.com’s Anupam Mittal claimed that IAMAI’s positions, which broadly paralleled those of Big Tech, suggested the influential lobby group had become a “mouthpiece for Big Tech”.
The latest strain is the latest sign of a rift in the relationship between Google, Amazon and other major US and Indian companies.
“The new 24-member Governing Council and IAMAI’s new Executive Council will take over from the current Councils at the upcoming Annual General Meeting. Elections to the IAMAI Governing Council are held every two years. 83 members of IAMAI ran in elections this year after the end of the previous council’s two-year term,” the IAMAI said in a statement Thursday.
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