Tech • Design • Ethnography Weekly Indian consumer insights - The India Notes 🇮🇳 (19,000+ subs) 👇
Bangalore, India
Joined November 2011
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- Following3.8K
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Dharmesh Ba retweeted
The new FEMA rules have made me an exporter of services to America. Because I make videos that YouTube (an American company) pays me for, I’m considered an exporter in the eyes of the RBI. As a result, I must sign an Export Declaration Form (corroborate it with my Adsense account), sign it, stamp it, and email it to the bank. The bank then also wants a hard copy of each EDF. This is for payments as small as $100 to as large as $50,000. And I must do this every single time.
If the state is going to wear down creators, freelancers, and internet service providers like this and add nightmarish friction to the process of getting paid, it makes sense to either scale up to become a corporation (unrealistic and impossible for many) or start dealing in petty cash and cease to trade with anyone outside of India or simply pack your digital enterprise up and participate in the lala and seth ji ball-bearing economy.
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
Caste & community remain a major consideration in marriage in Tier-2 & Tier-3 India.
In our recent study, 78% of arranged-marriage respondents said caste or community was non-negotiable. Even among love-marriage respondents, it was 48%.
lokalapps.com/research
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
Chennai makkale, oru intimate, indie music show panna varuveengala? Featuring only original music? Support ethirpaakalama? 🥹❤️
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
congratulations team Conductor!!!
If you are looking for a new cloud agent setup, try brahma.sh. Add its MCP server (brahma.sh/mcp) to your agent and ask it to migrate you over.
DM me, and get free sandbox usage (BYOK for llms) till EOY
I am very excited to share that Conductor is joining Meta!
We have some big, crazy plans for the next interface. If you liked Conductor, you’re gonna love what’s coming.
We’re super excited to work with @natfriedman and @alexandr_wang at MSL to build it. They’ve been on an absolute tear, and I’m convinced MSL has the highest talent density of all the labs.
A huge thank you to our earliest believers @aaron_epstein, @ilyasu, and @nabeel. And to everyone here who tried Conductor, sent us feedback, and prompt requests - you made this so much fun. Thank you ❤️🚂
Choo choo!
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
We got @OncourseAI to 80k+ signups as a small bootstrapped team, and I built @caddie_app in a week on the side.
So we wrote down the 15 principles we actually work by with agents
My favourite: keep at least five agents running, day and night.
usecaddie.app/blog/agents
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
remember if this can happen to a sitting MP do you really think a common citizen has any immunity from the state's unilateral impunity
Manhandled, dragged, assaulted n misbehaved inside a police vehicle and dumped by the roadside - for the crime of speaking to the media.
This is not merely an assault on an MP. It is an assault on democratic freedoms and the rule of law. More chillingly, it happened within hours of the Supreme Court issuing directions to safeguard peaceful protest and constitutional rights.
I have written to the Hon’ble President of India @rashtrapatibhvn , the Chairman of the Rajya Sabha @VPIndia and the Chief Justice of India seeking urgent intervention and fixing accountability for the police personnel, and action on the question of parliamentary privilege.
The Government cannot intimidate democracy into silence. It cannot substitute the force of the baton for the force of debate. And it shouldn’t expect the people to surrender their constitutional freedoms merely because those in power find dissent inconvenient. The strength of a democracy lies not in its capacity to suppress dissent, but in its ability to address it.
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
wait, so the indian govt actually has the capability and resources for lightning-fast, large-scale mobilization?
so we actually can make the city safer for women and improve regional security? how stupid of me to think the scale of the country was the problem.
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
First in my bloodline to see a protest has achieved its objective even before it begins
CJP
History ✌️
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
YOU COULDNT DO THIS WHEN WOMEN WERE BEING MURDERED AND ASSAULTED ALL OVER DELHI?
#WATCH | Delhi: Numerous CCTV cameras are installed in the area around Jantar Mantar, in view of a protest called by the Cockroach Janta Party on 10th October. Section 163 BNSS is enforced in the area
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
the potential I see in other people isn’t real. It is a projection of what I would have done in their position.
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
In any civilized country, this man's political career would be over. It's a shame that we live in such a feudal society that this kind of behaviour is tolerated. And sadly 95% of politicians behave the same way when the cameras aren't rolling.
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
@ChennaiTraffic can you pls help clear this vehicle. It is parked right outside home and we are not able to take our vehicle outside.
Near Mandaveli Bus terminus
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
So @district_india and @zomato @zomatocare @carebydistrict have started a new fraud scheme
1. Get people to book an event for ₹10k
2. 2 weeks before the event send 1 email to them (that goes to their spam folder) telling them the event is postponed now to be 2 months later
3. Give them 6 days notice to cancel and NEVER inform them over call or WhatsApp
4. Tell them they can't cancel or refund it because the 6 days are now over
This must easily make crores in revenue every month. Great work 👏
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
Travelled 1.5 hours for a 12:30 PM doctor’s appointment.
Doctor shows up at 1:30. By 2:15, we’re still waiting because the hospital CEO has dropped in for an unscheduled chat.
Staff: “What can we do, sir? CEO is talking to the doctor. We can’t interrupt.”
By 3 PM, three of us finally say: “There are three CEOs waiting outside too. This is Bangalore, every fifth person is a CEO. Can we see the doctor now?”
Peak Bangalore 😂
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
Products from Daily Objects seem overpriced by 50% even after being available at 50% off.
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
Same story at @foldmoney_. BillDesk application live since March, still pending.
Video KYC rejected because a director was at our Bengaluru office instead of the address on his Aadhaar, told to travel to his home state to verify a Bengaluru company. Felt like 2010.
pls help @GoogleIndia @billdesk 🙏
I have lost INR 3,00,000- INR 4,00,000 because of @Google & @billdesk - and 100s of other developers across India are facing the same issue.
>I build mobile apps with In-app purchases & Subscriptions.
>Users download the apps for free and pay for features in-app
>I publish these apps on Apple App Store & Google Play Store
>Majority of my installs come from Google, organically
Now here is what happened:
>Google Play in India requires you to be verified via a 3rd party agency,
mandated by @RBI
>The third party agency is BillDesk
>2 months ago I started my verification process with BillDesk
>My application got rejected 10-12 times without any feedback, frustrated I asked them to give me callback to explain the issue
>On the call they said I had to cancel and restart my entire application - 5 weeks ago.
>I completed all online verification formalities
5 weeks ago, Google stopped users from purchasing all IAPs in my apps because my payments account was not verified.
❌ At this point I have ~$2,000 in my Google Play account that cannot be deposited in my bank account due to incomplete verification.
❌ Unknowingly I was also spending money on paid-ads - which all went to 0 because of this.
>Now for the past 5 weeks, I have been mailing them everyday to get an update on my application
>I only get template responses
>I reached out to them via X, LinkedIn, Mail but no response
>My downloads are growing everyday but my Google Play revenue is 0
(which is supposed to be ~3L for the last 30 days now looking at the growth)
And this is not just me - if you go on Reddit and type "Billdesk verification" you will see what I mean.
>Some have even mentioned they ask for bribes lol
Srinivasu MN Parul Verma Viswanath Kuppa
(tagging whoever I find from BillDesk)
I usually avoid writing rant posts but I don't have anything to lose at this point :))
Dharmesh Ba retweeted
I have lost INR 3,00,000- INR 4,00,000 because of @Google & @billdesk - and 100s of other developers across India are facing the same issue.
>I build mobile apps with In-app purchases & Subscriptions.
>Users download the apps for free and pay for features in-app
>I publish these apps on Apple App Store & Google Play Store
>Majority of my installs come from Google, organically
Now here is what happened:
>Google Play in India requires you to be verified via a 3rd party agency,
mandated by @RBI
>The third party agency is BillDesk
>2 months ago I started my verification process with BillDesk
>My application got rejected 10-12 times without any feedback, frustrated I asked them to give me callback to explain the issue
>On the call they said I had to cancel and restart my entire application - 5 weeks ago.
>I completed all online verification formalities
5 weeks ago, Google stopped users from purchasing all IAPs in my apps because my payments account was not verified.
❌ At this point I have ~$2,000 in my Google Play account that cannot be deposited in my bank account due to incomplete verification.
❌ Unknowingly I was also spending money on paid-ads - which all went to 0 because of this.
>Now for the past 5 weeks, I have been mailing them everyday to get an update on my application
>I only get template responses
>I reached out to them via X, LinkedIn, Mail but no response
>My downloads are growing everyday but my Google Play revenue is 0
(which is supposed to be ~3L for the last 30 days now looking at the growth)
And this is not just me - if you go on Reddit and type "Billdesk verification" you will see what I mean.
>Some have even mentioned they ask for bribes lol
Srinivasu MN Parul Verma Viswanath Kuppa
(tagging whoever I find from BillDesk)
I usually avoid writing rant posts but I don't have anything to lose at this point :))