S Krishnan, Secretary in Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Government of India | Photo Credit: SUSHIL KUMAR VERMA

The government has asked the global internet body, ICANN, to set up root servers in India, a senior government official said on Friday.

Speaking at the NIXI event, Ministry of Electronics and IT Secretary S Krishnan said there should be one root server in India to cater to the needs of the huge population of the country.

"We have been pushing for locating a root server in India given the number of people who use the internet and in terms of long-term resilience of the internet system itself," Krishnan said.

A root server is the core part of the internet that connects users to websites.

Whenever any user on the internet types the name of a website, sends an email to any particular address or carries out any search on the internet, the query goes to root servers located in the US, which, like an exchange, search the location of a website or URL on the World Wide Web and then connect the user with them.

Most governments have been demanding that root servers should be located in their countries. Some governments have also raised concerns about security threats and cyber espionage because the servers are located in only one country.

When asked about the development and ICANN’s response, Krishnan said it is a long process to ensure that servers can be located in India.

"There are other ways in which we are making sure that adequate memory is there, mirror sites are there. We are building resilience, it's not that we are dependent only on that resilience, but I think it's important from the overall internet governance point of view that the infrastructure is spread throughout the world," Krishnan said.

Published on June 20, 2026