PUBG Mobile: No formal dialogue between Krafton and MeitY currently, says RTI report

Over the years, PUBG Mobile has created a solid footing in the battle royale genre on the mobile platform. It has emerged as one of the industry's juggernauts, becoming a household name in India.

But the game's fans and players received disheartening news in early September after it was placed on the list of 118 Chinese applications that were blocked by the Ministry of Information and Technology.

Since then, there have been many updates about PUBG Mobile's return in the country, with the latest one being the response to an RTI filed by GemWire.

The RTI was filed on December 17th, 2020, and sought information from the government about the famous battle royale title in India. The response has revealed no formal dialogues between Krafton Inc and the MeitY as of now.

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PUBG Mobile's parent company, Krafton, and MeitY aren't in any discussions right now

As stated earlier, the RTI was filed on December 17th, 2020, and contained numerous queries, one of which was:

"Is there an open dialogue taking place between MEITY and PUBG Corporation/Krafton INC?"

The response was:

"No formal dialogue with PUBG/Krafton is held by this Ministry."

It is now evident that there is no form of a formal dialogue between PUBG Mobile's parent company and the Ministry, which suggests that Indian fans and users might have to wait further for its comeback.

The answers to the remaining two queries revealed that PUBG Mobile was not banned in the country. On the contrary, it was only blocked by the Government of India.

Also, the reply to the final query has cleared the clouds around the alternative version. It states that the restriction is only directed towards specific applications, i.e., the global version of PUBG Mobile and its toned-down version - PUBG Mobile Lite - and not the other region-specific versions.

The other two queries, along with their response, were:

Q. Will a new app (PUBG Mobile India) published by a different publisher, having no ties with China and abiding by the regulations of MEITY, be subjected to the previous ban placed on the PUBG MOBILE Nordic Map: Livik app? Note: The ban, as stated, was for a specific application: PUBG MOBILE Nordic Map: Livik, not PUBG as a whole entity.

"This Ministry has not 'banned' for public access the PUBG Mobile Nordic Map: Livik App under the provisions of Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, 2000."

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Q. Follow up to the first question, if the ban implies to the new application, on what basis would that be?

"Blocking applies to a specific App only."