Our Terms & Conditions | Our Privacy Policy
Nixi plans to secure .Bharat, .India domains next year: CEO
The National Internet Exchange of India (Nixi), the nodal agency managing the country code top-level domains, aims to secure ‘.India’ and ‘.Bharat’ domains at the next new generic top-level domain (gTLD) round slated to open next year, its CEO said.
A decision on applying for the new gTLDs during the post-first quarter of 2026 window by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) will be taken after due approval from with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Nixi chief executive Devesh Tyagi told ET.
The new proposal will be for the .Bharat domain, spelled in the Latin script, he said. Nixi has already enabled .भारत domains, spelled out in all 22 official Indian languages, Tyagi said.
Unlike .in, which is a country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for India, the .भारत domain is an internationalised domain name (IDN) that represents Indian official languages and scripts.
While early adoption was slow, Tyagi said adoption is now increasing among regional publishers, schools, and local businesses.
The total number of registered .in domains has crossed 4.1 million. In comparison, registrations for .भारत and other Indian language domains are over 250,000, according to Nixi data.
Nixi has also introduced third-level domain names such as .dr.in and .travel.in for the medical and travel sectors, respectively.
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) regulates the internet’s protocol for domain names and numbers. Its upcoming gTLD application round is being held after 14 years.
It will give Indian companies, businesses, cities, and organisations a rare chance to apply for their own domain name extensions, and “define their own identities on the internet,” Tyagi said.
“Whether it’s a brand, a city, or a community, owning a gTLD gives long-term strategic value,” he added.
While international corporations like Google (.google), Microsoft (.microsoft), and Barclays (.barclays) already operate their own extensions, India’s footprint in the last round was modest. Only a handful of Indian companies applied, and even fewer moved forward with active usage.
Currently there are more than 1,200 gTLDs, the majority of which are in English, such as .com, .org, .biz, or .info.
Nixi believes securing a custom domain can help local businesses establish global credibility, much like geographic TLDs such as .nyc and .rio have done for cities.
Established in 2003 as a non-profit, Nixi plays a central role in managing India’s internet domains and supporting a multilingual digital ecosystem in the country, and operates several internet exchange points (IXPs) to enable efficient domestic traffic routing.
Local internet
While currently there are 77 IXPs nationwide, Tyagi said this needs to be massively expanded to improve ground-level connectivity.
IXPs are crucial for keeping local internet traffic local.
“This reduces latency cuts, transit costs, and improves speed,” Tyagi said. “Beyond technical performance, our IXPs help democracy access by spreading infrastructure into tier-2 and tier-3 cities. We are reducing dependence on a few large hubs and making internet access more affordable in underserved areas,” he stressed.
Images are for reference only.Images and contents gathered automatic from google or 3rd party sources.All rights on the images and contents are with their legal original owners.
Comments are closed.