After Google, Meta loses public policy head in India

TechCrunch

3 days ago

Meta's head of public policy in India, Shivnath Thukral, is leaving the social networking company, nearly three and a half years after joining, and just months after his counterpart at Google stepped down.
Thukral spent over seven and a half years at Meta and took over as public policy lead for the South Asian market — the company's largest user base — in November 2022, after his predecessor Rajiv Aggarwal left.
'Having helped build some of the systems and processes, I do feel it is a good time to let the engine and the team work on their own. As my next journey begins, I want to recognize the work of my team, which is the best in business and one of the reasons why this is such a difficult decision for me,' Thukral said in a LinkedIn post on Wednesday.
Thukral's exit comes just months after Meta won relief in India over WhatsApp's 2021 data-sharing policy, which had earlier resulted in a five-year ban by the country's antitrust regulator. The company had warned that the antitrust ruling could force the rollback of its features.
Nonetheless, Meta, which has the biggest user base for Facebook and WhatsApp, and the largest market for its Meta AI usage in India, still faces regulatory challenges as the country moves toward enacting its anticipated data privacy rules that may require parental consent to serve children.
Meta also faces criticism from Indian telcos, as WhatsApp has over 500 million users in the country, and a large segment of them uses the instant messaging service instead of traditional telecom services for communicating over text, voice, and video calls. Similarly, WhatsApp is often criticized for not restricting spam on its platform in India, although the app did bring changes that were touted to restrict unsolicited business communication.
'It is not an easy decision to make, but I feel very confident that our policy engagement with stakeholders is at a credible and constructive juncture, and we can only build further on that. There is always more to do, and I know the team is well equipped to navigate the waters well,' Thukral wrote.
Meta confirmed to TechCrunch that the company has not appointed Thukral's replacement.
In February, Google's policy head, Sreenivasa Reddy, quit. Reddy had replaced former Indian antitrust official Archana Gulati, who resigned in 2022 just five months after joining.
Google has not yet appointed a replacement for Reddy, and his exit occurred amid the search giant's antitrust cases in the country, some of which are yet to be settled.
'Shivnath Thukral is leaving Meta to pursue new opportunities,' said Kevin Martin, Meta VP and head of global policy, in a prepared statement. 'As a member of the India leadership team, he played a key role in navigating and shaping policy and regulatory conversations and engagements that were critical for the industry and Meta in India over the last 7.5 years. We thank him for his leadership and contributions, and wish him well in his future endeavors,' he added.