India’s space policy: Outer space has changed from a pristine arena for scientific exploration into a domain where geopolitics, technology and national power increasingly overlap. Navigation, battlefield awareness, communications and remote sensing now depend on satellites. Over the past decade, the more consequential change has been the rapid expansion of commercial space activity and the growing role of private companies in infrastructure once dominated by states.
That shift has exposed a gap between the speed of technological deployment and the pace of rule-making. Private companies can move faster than governments, while governments increasingly rely on them for strategic and economic objectives. The result is a space economy in which commercial decisions can have geopolitical consequences.
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Space law was written for a different era
The Outer Space Treaty of 1967 remains the foundation of international space law. It establishes that outer space is free for exploration and use by all states and cannot be subject to national appropriation. At the same time, it makes states internationally responsible for national space activities, including those carried out by non-governmental entities. Commercial activity was therefore not excluded from the treaty framework, but the treaty did not create the detailed regulatory architecture that today’s commercial space economy requires.
The wider legal framework, including the Rescue Agreement, Liability Convention and Registration Convention, continues to provide the basic rules. Yet many of the practical questions confronting today’s space industry are governed through more specialised regulatory arrangements, particularly the International Telecommunication Union’s rules on spectrum and satellite networks.
The allocation of orbital and spectrum resources illustrates the problem. For geostationary satellite services, the ITU operates both planned arrangements designed to secure equitable access and coordination procedures for other networks. In some non-planned services, first-come, first-served principles form part of the regulatory process. This is more complicated than a simple race to file first, but it still gives the timing and quality of filings considerable strategic importance.
The consequence is that technological deployment can get ahead of international regulation. Once infrastructure, spectrum use and industrial capabilities are established, subsequent rule-making takes place against facts already created in orbit.
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Starlink shows the advantage of moving early
The clearest illustration is Starlink. SpaceX chose low Earth orbit rather than competing primarily for the scarce geostationary positions used by conventional satellite communications. LEO satellites offer lower latency and can support large constellations, making the orbit attractive for broadband and other applications.
The scale of Starlink is now difficult for competitors to ignore. In September 2026, the constellation had more than 11,000 active satellites, according to reporting on SpaceX’s latest launches.
Scale brings commercial advantages, but it also changes the operating environment for everyone else. A large constellation affects spectrum coordination, collision avoidance, space-traffic management and the economics of market entry. The issue is not that one company has acquired ownership of an orbit. The Outer Space Treaty does not permit such national appropriation. The issue is that an early and rapidly expanding constellation can influence the practical conditions under which later entrants must operate.
That is the structural weakness of a legal order built around broad principles while technology advances through rapid deployment. Later rules may constrain future entrants differently from incumbents that established their systems under an earlier regulatory environment.
For developing and middle-tier space powers, the danger is therefore subtler than exclusion by law. They may retain a formal right to use outer space while finding that commercially valuable orbital regimes, spectrum resources, supply chains and technological capabilities have already become difficult and expensive to enter.
India needs more than a larger private space industry
India recognised the changing environment when it opened the space sector to greater private participation in 2020 and established IN-SPACe as the nodal agency for promoting, enabling, authorising and supervising activities by non-governmental entities.
The Indian Space Policy 2023 goes further. It seeks greater private participation across the space value chain while retaining a public role in advanced research and national capabilities. ISRO is expected to focus on advanced technology and newer systems, while mature systems are to move towards industrial production and commercial exploitation.
That division of labour is sensible. But industrial participation by itself does not create strategic leverage. India can have more launch companies, satellite manufacturers and downstream applications without necessarily acquiring greater influence over the rules governing future space activity.
This distinction matters as competition moves towards new orbital regimes. VLEO, or very low Earth orbit, generally refers to altitudes below conventional LEO, with commercial proposals often concentrating around the 200-400 km range. Its attractions include lower latency and higher-resolution imaging. Its disadvantages are equally significant: atmospheric drag, shorter satellite lifetimes, demanding propulsion requirements and the need for frequent replenishment.
The commercial interest is nevertheless growing. Juniper Research estimated investment in VLEO satellite launches at $17.2 billion in 2024 and projected that global investment could reach $220 billion by 2027. These are forecasts, not realised investment figures, and should be treated accordingly.
VLEO is an opportunity, but the window will not remain open
India’s opportunity in VLEO lies in connecting its existing strengths in small satellites, launch technology, materials and space research rather than creating a wholly separate industrial ecosystem.
The first priority should be reusable and small launch systems capable of replenishing VLEO constellations economically. Shorter orbital lifetimes make launch cadence and replacement costs especially important.
The second is to connect space requirements with capabilities already being developed in solar technology, materials and power systems. VLEO missions should draw on India’s broader industrial and research base rather than becoming isolated space programmes.
The third is international cooperation. Partnerships with countries pursuing similar interests could give India greater influence in developing technical standards and norms for emerging orbital regimes.
The fourth is focused research on atmospheric drag, de-orbit reliability, thermal protection and propulsion. Publicly developed intellectual property should also reach private companies on commercially workable terms where national security considerations permit. The purpose is to convert difficult engineering problems into capabilities that Indian firms can sell.
The point is not that VLEO will automatically become the next dominant commercial orbit. It is that emerging orbital regimes offer a period in which technological capability and regulatory practice are still developing together. That makes early investment more consequential.
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India’s space policy must connect exploration with power
None of this requires India to abandon its commitment to peaceful uses of outer space or the legal obligations it has accepted under the UN space treaties. It requires a more realistic reading of what those treaties do and do not guarantee.
The Outer Space Treaty establishes freedom of exploration and use and rejects national appropriation. It does not guarantee that every country will enjoy equal commercial influence over the technologies, infrastructure and supply chains that develop around space activity.
Equitable access therefore cannot depend entirely on restraint by those seeking to enter the space economy. It also depends on the ability to develop systems, use spectrum and orbital resources responsibly, sustain industrial capacity and participate credibly in international rule-making.
India has already taken the first step by opening its space sector to private investment. The harder task is to decide where that capital, combined with public research, should be deployed.
Space exploration and space industry should not be treated as separate policy compartments. Scientific capability creates technological options; industrial capability turns those options into usable systems; sustained deployment gives a country a voice in the rules that govern them.
The strategic question for India is therefore simple, even if the answer is not: will it merely participate in the expanding space economy, or build enough capability in emerging orbital regimes to have a meaningful say in how that economy develops?
Shrijeet Phadke is a lawyer based in Mumbai.