Facebook fights back in row over its free internet for India’s poor

Campaign aims to restore its Free Basics plan for 'unconnected billion'

The green light on Pushpa Kaushik's modem hasn't come on for the past three months. When she first got internet access in her home a year ago, all the people of Lalpur, a small village in Uttar Pradesh, northern India, used to come to her house to use her computer. Some needed to check their bank accounts, others wanted to learn English, and some even wanted to look for solutions to their medical problems.

Village girls studying at the local university used to come to her house to look for reading material online. Now that Kaushik's green light has gone dark, they have to walk an hour to the nearest town just to pick up a book.