Indian American Ajit Pai, a commissioner in the US communications regulatory agency, has met President-elect amid speculation that he may head the body that deals with cellphone spectrum and broadcasting. Trump’s spokesperson Sean Spicer said that the meeting with Pai, who is the Republican nominee on the Federal Communication Commission (FCC), had took place on Monday.
Presently FCC is headed by Tom Wheeler, a nominee of the Democratic Party, and a change in leadership is expected with the election of Trump. The position of FCC chairman has to be approved by the Senate. The Federal Communication Commission is the federal authority for regulating radio, television, phone, cellphone spectrum and services, internet and satellite and cable.
Indian Americans have 1 percent representation in US congress – Forbes
Pai, parents are doctors, who had migrated from India, is a lawyer and has served with the government, Congress and the private sector. As a free enterprise advocate in the Republican mould, he has been a critic of the functioning of the FCC. Recently, he has taken the issue with an FCC report that had questioned the legality of offerings that are used by the people to access online music, videos and other content free of charge.
Trump has already nominated two Indian-Americans to the high-level positions: Nikki Haley as the Cabinet-level Ambassador to the United Nations and Seema Verma as the head of the agency for government health insurance programmes. Trump has also appointed Raj Shah as his deputy assistant and research director in the White House staff.
Indian-American congressman Krishna Moorthy in two influential house panels
Indian American, Balaji Srinivasan, has met Trump and Spicer had said that he is under consideration for a role at the Federal Drug Administration (FDA). Srinivasan is a technology entrepreneur who has founded a biotech company and has been critical about the links between the large pharmaceutical companies and the FDA and the agency’s reach, that he asserted stifles tech innovations.
He currently heads a start-up that deals with bitcoin, the internet-based currency.
By Premji
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