India has endorsed the Call to Action for 6G Leadership and Security, joining the United States and 24 other nations in an international 6G initiative that will shape the sixth generation of wireless communications. The announcement came through a Press Information Bureau release on 9 September 2026. The release followed the G20 Innovation Ministerial, which met at Chapel Hill in North Carolina on 1 and 2 September 2026. The endorsement puts India among the countries that will help set the terms for sixth-generation networks, in an effort announced by the American side.
India’s delegation at the ministerial was led by Minister of State Jitin Prasada, who holds the electronics and information technology and commerce and industry portfolios. Prasada met United States Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on the sidelines of the event. The United States Department of Commerce announced the 6G initiative, and the meeting gave the two sides a direct exchange on it before the formal endorsement.
The 6G initiative is built on six shared principles: openness, interoperability, security, resilience, resource efficiency and innovation-led competition. Openness and interoperability mean the group wants future networks designed to shared rules that different vendors can work with, while security and resilience put protection and reliability at the center. Resource efficiency and innovation-led competition round out the terms every member has accepted as the basis for how the next generation of networks gets defined. The six terms will guide how member countries approach standard-setting, equipment and deployment in the years ahead.
Union Minister of Communications Jyotiraditya M. Scindia announced India’s backing for the 6G initiative on social media, writing: “Bharat For 6G! An absolute delight to announce India’s endorsement of the Call to Action for 6G Leadership and Security, joining 24 like-minded nations in advancing an open, interoperable, secure and resilient next-generation network.”
What the 6G initiative covers
The countries named so far include Canada, Costa Rica, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Honduras, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Norway, Paraguay, the Republic of Korea, Romania, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States. India is among the countries endorsing the 6G initiative, taking the membership to 26 nations counting the United States. The list spans North America, Latin America, Europe and East Asia. Each of the named members has joined the United States in backing the call to action.
The signatories commit to the six principles as the shared basis for future standards. The Department of Telecommunications will lead India’s follow-up on the 6G initiative, working with government agencies, industry and academia on the steps ahead. The department’s role puts the follow-up in the hands of the ministry that runs India’s telecom policy. That follow-up brings together the policy side, the companies that will build the networks and the universities doing the research.
India’s 10 percent goal under the 6G initiative
India aims to contribute 10 percent of global 6G standards and patents. The figure is the concrete measure India has set for itself: a tenth of the patents and standards that will define the next generation. Minister of State for Communications Dr Chandra Sekhar Pemmasani described the endorsement as India’s shift from a technology adopter to a standard-setter, a framing that puts the endorsement in the context of India’s longer telecom ambitions.
The Department of Telecommunications began 6G roadmap consultations at the start of October 2026, within weeks of the endorsement. The consultations cover AI integration and universal coverage, including links between ground towers and satellites. The early-October timing puts the consultations right after the September endorsement, so domestic planning and the international commitment are moving together. The government wants commercial 6G services by 2030. India enters the 6G initiative with 5G coverage already in place in every district, delivered through about 5.6 lakh base transceiver stations, while BharatNet is extending fibre toward villages.
The 5G base and the road to 2030
Reliance Jio has demonstrated a pre-6G stack built in-house along with a Giga MIMO radio. The pre-6G stack was built by Jio itself, and the Giga MIMO radio adds to the hardware the company has shown publicly. India’s home-grown 4G stack runs on about 110,000 towers. Mobile phone production has reached Rs 6.27 lakh crore, with exports near 28 billion dollars. That domestic base is what India brings to the 6G initiative, from network hardware to the scale of its manufacturing.