IAMAI announces elections amid allegations of pushing pro-Big tech interest

The Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) on Monday announced that 83 members will be contesting the election to its 24-member governing council.

The moves comes at a time when the industry body has been hit by infighting and a spate of allegations that it was pushing the views and interests of Big Tech companies.

In a statement, IAMAI said the results of the election will be declared at the end of May and the new Governing Council will take over after the Annual General Meeting in June.

"Eighty-three members of the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) would be contesting the election to the 24-member IAMAI Governing Council.

"The nominees of the top three firms, in terms of votes received in this election, would become the Chairperson, Vice Chairperson and Treasurer of the association, and form its Executive Council," IAMAI said.

Elections are conducted every two years at IAMAI. The tenure of both the Governing Council and the Executive Council is two years.

"All 500-plus members of IAMAI, with the exception of a few companies which are less than two years old, are eligible to contest as well as vote in the elections," it added.

Further, IAMAI said it has a composite membership of large global and Indian companies as well as smaller global and Indian companies. At present, 65 per cent of the membership of IAMAI comprise of Indian companies.

Its president Subho Ray said, "IAMAI has a very transparent and regular process of elections to the extent that we do not allow solicitation and post-election if any member has any concern the results can be duly audited".

There are simmering differences within the industry body and the latest flashpoint being IAMAI's submissions on digital competition law as a section of members alleged that the association was driving the interest of Big Tech at the cost of digital startups.

Earlier this month, Rohan Verma, CEO and Executive Director of MapmyIndia accused IAMAI of "parroting and promoting" views that are "pro-foreign Big Tech".

"I hope everyone realises that the Chair & Vice Chair of IAMAI are from the Foreign Big Tech. Sad to see an org originally founded by and for Indian companies, taken over and now promoting a false narrative.

"IAMAI views & submissions to govt and media on digital policies, regulations, laws etc are completely wrong and antithetical to what Indians - consumers, industry, government - need," Verma had tweeted on May 1.