Licensed service providers are required to put up lawful interception facilities for all types of communication services, including satellite phones, in the country. No other satellite phone service provider has agreed to put up interception facilities and, therefore have not been granted permission to offer satellite phone services in India, said Milind Deora, the Minister of State for Communications and Information in a discussion at the Lok Sabha.

At present satellite phone services in India are offered by Tata Communications  through Inmarsat, which has their land earth station at Dighi, Pune, through which these services can be monitored. Tata Communications is a distribution partner for inmarsat. You can read more about the partnership here.

The Tata Global Network includes one of the most advanced and largest submarine cable networks, a Tier-1 IP network, with connectivity to more than 200 countries across 400 PoPs, and nearly 1 million square feet of data center and colocation space worldwide, according to its corporate website. The company’s reach in emerging markets include Indian enterprise data services, besides strategic investments in South Africa (Neotel), Sri Lanka (Tata Communications Lanka Limited), and Nepal (United Telecom Limited). Tata Communications Limited is listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange and the National Stock Exchange of India and its ADRs are listed on the New York Stock Exchange. (NYSE: TCL). Read more about Tata Communications here.

Inmarsat began operating in 1979 and is one of the leading providers of global mobile communications services. Following the acquisition of Stratos Global Corporation in April 2009, Inmarsat has two principal operating divisions, Inmarsat Global and Stratos Global. The company owns a fleet of 11 geostationary satellites. You can read more about Inmersat in their corporate website.