Lessons from Digital India for the Right to Internet Access

Abstract: With only 65% of Indian houses having access to the Internet, digital India faces a significant Internet divide across gender and city types. Rendering essential services inaccessible to almost a third of the population necessitates not only provisioning a fundamental right to Internet access but taking specific constructive steps to assure its simple, affordable and safe accessibility. Establishing such a right would also pave way for other ancillary rights required for data privacy, protection from Internet's possible harms and the requirement to be treated fairly. We first discuss two arguments on the universal right to Internet access; from Merten Reglitz, a senior lecturer on Global Ethics and from Vincent Cerf, one of the founding creators of the Internet who has had a profound influence on the field. We specifically argue why Internet access should be treated as a fundamental right. We discuss the learnings from India, contextualizing them with the global debate and argue for establishing Internet access as a fundamental right in India and elsewhere in the form of government legislation to eliminate Internet divide.