Facebook Pulls the Plug on Free Basics in India after TRAI Ruling

Feb 12, 2016, 20:54
Facebook Pulls the Plug on Free Basics in India after TRAI Ruling

Facebook India's managing director Kirthiga Reddy has announced she will be stepping down after six years and moving back to the US. "It's a bittersweet moment to share that the return timeframe is coming up in the next 6-12 months", Reddy said in a post on the social networking site today. "Our two daughters start high school and middle school this coming year- which serves as a natural transition point to make this move back", Reddy said in her Facebook post.

While overtly vocal in supporting Facebook's global cause of giving free mobile internet access to people through its lightweight Free Basics Program, Andreessen's twitter statement did not offer much help to the company's legal woes in India.

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She further added that she will be working closely with William Easton and Dan Neary to find a successor for her.

"I could not be more excited about where the Facebook business is in India, where we are going and what's to come".

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Given the vast user base in India, the stand taken by TRAI is a significant setback for Facebook, which had changed the internet.org campaign to Free Basics to position it as a noble idea of connecting a billion users around the world who have no access to Internet.

Facebook had been embroiled in a lengthy and public battle with TRAI and pro net neutrality activists for its Free Basics service, which it had launched with RCom.

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Free Basics, for which Facebook had tied up with Reliance Communications, is an app that promises free access to the Internet for a host of basic services on topics like news, health, travel, sports, jobs and communication. The Telecom regulator on Monday barred all forms of differential pricing except in the case of emergency services, putting an end to Free Basics in India, and the social network withdrew the programme from India on Thursday.

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