Google India honcho Archana Gulati resigns even as tech giant is under scrutiny

Google India’s government affairs and public policy head Archana Gulati, has resigned from her post after serving the tech giant for five months. She is an economics graduate and a Ph.D. from IIT-Delhi. Archana was working as Joint Secretary (Digital Communications) at NITI Aayog, a government think tank 5 months back before she joined Google India. But now she has resigned from her post, sources said. The reason behind her resignation from Google India is yet to be known. When contacted by PTI, both Gulati and Google refused to provide a statement on the matter.

Gulati’s resignation came at a time when Google is facing a series of antitrust cases in India and stricter tech-sector regulations. The Competition Commission of India (CCI), where Gulati had also previously worked, is probing Google’s business conduct in the smart TVs market, its Android operating system, as well as its in-app payments system. One of the key cases against Google is its in-app payment system on the Play Store.

Before joining Google India, Gulati was working on the digital communications policy matters at NITI Aayog from August 2019 to March 2021. She took voluntary retirement last year and did freelancing for a year before joining Google in May this year.

According to her LinkedIn profile, Gulati was also an officer on special duty in the telecom secretary’s office from May 2017 to August 2019.

Gulati also served as the head of combinations division at the Competition Commission of India and advised the Commission on competition issues created due to mergers and acquisitions.

Gulati was joint administrator in the finance division at the telecom ministry’s Universal Services Obligation Fund of India from May 2007 to February 2012. There she used to look after financial aspects of the design and implementation of USOF schemes as well as subsidy disbursement.