(Photo: The Hindu Business Line)

The Indian government has said it wants the tech giants to pay media companies for using their content.

The Minister of State for IT and Electronics, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, said the government was considering revising IT laws to bring about this change.

The aim is to create a revenue-sharing bridge between internet companies like Google and Facebook and digital news providers.

The minister told The Times of India new laws and rules were being considered because the market power on digital advertising being exercised by the big tech companies placed Indian media companies at a disadvantage.

The new laws would force big tech companies to pay digital news publishers a share of the revenue earned via using their original content.

Google has already signed deals to pay more than 300 publishers in Germany, France and other EU countries for using their content on its platform. A similar agreement has been signed in Australia. Canada is moving in the same direction.