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India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has revived discussions around a long-pending National Data Centre Policy that was first proposed in 2020 but never put into action. The renewed consultations aim to update the policy framework to reflect how the data centre sector has evolved over the last five years, especially with growing demand driven by cloud computing and artificial intelligence. Industry stakeholders were recently invited to a consultation in New Delhi to offer feedback and recommendations.
Key features under consideration include a single-window clearance system to simplify and speed up approvals, streamlined regulatory processes, incentives for investors, and measures to promote domestic manufacturing of related infrastructure components. The draft also discusses creating four Data Centre Economic Zones to spread capacity more evenly across the country rather than concentrating it in major metro regions.
The government has already granted infrastructure status to data centres of 5 MW or above, and industry players are urging for a more uniform policy that builds on state-level measures already in place. With India’s data centre capacity rapidly expanding and expected to grow significantly in coming years, the updated policy seeks to attract investments and improve ease of doing business in this critical digital infrastructure segment.
