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Google on Friday removed from its Play Store many Indian apps,
including Matrimony.com's popular Bharat Matrimony and job
search app Naukri, saying the companies were not abiding by its
in-app payment guidelines.
Vaishnaw said he has held talks with Google and will meet the
startups, which needed protection in India.
"This cannot be permitted. This kind of de-listing cannot be
permitted," he said in a statement.
Google declined to comment.
The removal has sparked criticism from many startups who have
for years protested and legally challenged many of the U.S.
giant's practices, including its in-app fee. Google says the
fees help develop and promote the Android and Play Store
ecosystem.
The dispute centers on efforts by some Indian startups to stop
Google from imposing a fee of 11%-26% on in-app payments, after
the country's antitrust authorities ordered it to not
mandatorily enforce an earlier system of charging 15%-30%.
But Google effectively received the go-ahead to charge the fee
or remove apps after two court decisions in January and
February, one by the Supreme Court.
Google said on Friday that some Indian companies had chosen not
to pay for the "immense value they receive on Google Play".
Among the worst hit by the removals is Matrimony.com which has
seen more than 150 of its apps dropped from the Play Store.
"All our apps have been removed and we are out of Play Store and
(that) means out of business," founder Murugavel Janakiraman
told Reuters on Saturday. "If this continuous for a long term
then we will have significant drop in revenue."
Info Edge, another affected company, had seen its job search app
Naukri and another real estate search app, removed. Many of the
company's app had been restored, its founder said on Saturday on
X, without elaborating.
Google briefly removed popular Indian payments app Paytm from
its Play Store in 2020 citing some policy violations. The move
led to the company's founder and the wider startup industry
joining together to challenge Google by launching their own app
stores and filing legal cases.
(Additional reporting by Dhwani Pandya; Editing by Mike
Harrison)
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