India’s 6G ambitions are expected to contribute $1.2 trillion to GDP by 2035, Union minister for communications Jyotiraditya Scindia said at the 9th edition of the India Mobile Congress 2025. “The country’s ambitions go well beyond 5G. Through the Bharat 6G Alliance, India is targeting ownership of 10% of global 6G patents, setting standards for the future of connectivity,” he said.
Charting the Next-Gen Telecom Future
The Bharat 6G Alliance signed two MoUs with Nasscom and the European Space Agency for fostering joint participation in the field of technology development at the event.
Scindia also highlighted the rapid growth of satellite communications, which is extending connectivity from land to sea to space. India’s satcom market, currently valued at around $4 billion, is expected to nearly triple to $15 billion by 2033, spanning telecom and broadcasting.
He said India is emerging as a “product nation”, rather than just a service economy — one that creates as well as consumes. This shift is reflected in rising patents, local design languages and the fusion of Indian craftsmanship with modern electronics.
“India has moved from a country where voice was a luxury to one that now accounts for 20% of the world’s mobile users, with 1.2 billion subscribers, he added.
Scindia noted that broadband users have grown from 60 million in 2014 to 944 million today, making India the world’s third-largest digital nation by subscriber base.
Citing the Prime Minister’s vision of telecom as “a medium of equity and opportunity”, he said digital connectivity has become a powerful economic equaliser across rural and urban India. He underlined that the revolution rests on four key pillars — democracy, demography, digital-first and delivery.
Digital public infrastructure as a global benchmark
Calling India’s Digital Public Infrastructure a “global benchmark,” Scindia said the Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) has transformed public services into entitlements and improved delivery mechanisms. Twenty countries are already in talks to adopt India’s DPI model, signalling its growing international footprint. He added that the government’s focus on expanding physical and digital infrastructure — from towers and antennas to BharatNet — is aimed at ensuring 100% connectivity saturation.
Scindia said that India’s digital transformation story cannot be complete without its swadeshi innovation engine.
He said the backbone of this revolution will be India’s digitally skilled workforce, which is set to become the world’s largest.
