
Studied at IIT, left high paying jobs to built business empire worth Rs 400000000000; company is…, founder is...
Sanjeev Barnwal and Vidit Aatrey were very close friends during college at IIT Delhi, and after graduation, Sanjeev joined Sony's core tech team and moved to Japan, where he gained significant experience in the industry. Throughout this journey, the spark in him for entrepreneurship didn't fade. He was ready to do something on his own. Soon, he reconnected Vidit, who was working with InMobi in Bangalore, to discuss launching a startup together.
In June 2015, Sanjeev and Vidit took the huge step to quit their high-paying jobs and pursue their entrepreneurial vision. Family and friends were worried and critical about leaving steady jobs, but they moved forward with their vision to build a fashion marketplace to help small businesses. With very limited money, they launched Meesho from a two-bedroom apartment in Koramangala, Bengaluru. The dining table was their first desk, and that was the beginning of Meesho!
Aatrey and Barnwal detected a situation — Platforms such as Facebook and WhatsApp were clearly being used, but not for business. They did what nobody else would do — build an app, Meesho, -because of their existing business model of enabling resellers to begin a business, especially homemakers. Sellers on Meesho can start with their own personal online store, and then promote those products to their social circles, chat with their customers on WhatsApp, and link their stores with their Facebook profiles. Meesho takes care of collecting the payments and delivering the goods, so the business aspect of owning your own business from your home became simple. Building an agency business from home, it is easy. Meesho simply takes a commission from sellers.

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Time of India
4 hours ago
- Time of India
Why economics should abjure ethics
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In 2024 I explained why, in my view, ethics must be expunged from public health. In doing so I also cited broader problems with the concept of ethics which make it unsuitable to inform public policy. A recent paper by Jim Dorn argued that the best argument for free trade is its morality. The economist Donald Boudreaux supported this: 'Jim Dorn is correct: The ultimate justification for free trade is that protectionism is unethical. What right do producers A, B, and C have to the income that you earn that you wish to spend purchasing imports? The answer is none.' I believe that Don Boudreaux is one of the finest economists of our time but I disagree with such rhetoric. Morality operates in an irrational world and carries the risk of being used to drive entirely opposing arguments. I will attempt to show in this piece that not just public health, economics must also abjure ethics. 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There is a good reason why there is no economics textbook on theology and ethics but many textbooks on how to identify costs and benefits of policy. Economists can readily demonstrate that free trade provides a net benefit to society while socialism, which confiscates property and destroys trade, causes more harm than good. Once the net benefits of capitalism and free trade are proven, readers can draw their own conclusion. We don't need to embellish our already powerful arguments with ethics. Ethics is often the first resort of the scoundrel There's an aphorism in India: 'Munh mein Ram, bagal mein churi'. It cautions us against those who proclaim loudly to be ethical (chanting the name of God at every step), for such people are capable of plunging a knife into our back when we are not watching. In 2024, I elaborated how 'ethics is a devious concept that has often been deployed since antiquity by elites to justify their misdemeanours'. In 2023 I showed how : 'Every soldier's God is on his side. Ethics is the most malleable instrument of human imagination. It is always misused by zealots.' Socialists and fascists lay claim to their superior ethics. In a chapter on 'Hitler's Ethics' in his 2004 book, From Darwin to Hitler, Richard Weikart explained that: '[I]t is clear from Hitler's writings and speeches that he was not amoral at all. On the contrary, he was highly moralistic and consistently applied his vision of morality to policy decisions'. Even when he was losing the war, in January 1945, Hitler said: 'The insight into the moral value of our conviction and the resulting objectives of our struggle for life give us and, above all, give me the strength to continue to wage this fight in the most difficult hours with the strongest faith'. In describing Marx's ethical goals, Frederick Engels wrote in his 1877 book, Anti-Duhring, about how communism would achieve '[a] really human morality which stands above class antagonisms and above any remembrance of them'. Who could object to such warm and fuzzy goals? But we know what communism actually does. Likewise, the founding Fabian socialist, Dr Havelock Ellis wrote in 1922 that 'The inspiring appeal of Socialism to ardent minds is no doubt ethical.' R. H. Tawney, a British Christian socialist, is reported to have believed that 'socialism…involves a moral transformation, not just an economic one'. In his 1949 essay advocating socialism, Albert Einstein plied the ethical argument: 'socialism is directed towards a social-ethical end. ….there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy'. 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Conflating private ethics with society-wide policy When people ask me what drives me, I cite 'nishkama karma', i.e. doing the right thing with no regard to the consequences. I'm not religious by the remotest stretch of imagination but this phrase from the Gita works for me. Everyone, however, differ on their understandings of 'right action'. We might think highly of our personal moral standards but that doesn't give us the authority to tell others how the world should be run. Instead, we should first rationally confirm that our beliefs do actually provide a net benefit to society, and then share these proofs with others. Objective, empirical proofs have a higher chance of persuading others than appeals to morality. Nobel prize winning economist cautioned economists from using arguments other than purely rational ones. In his 1960 book, The Constitution of Liberty, he noted that 'noble sentiments' have often been 'mobilized in the service of greatly perverted aims'. He explained that using such (moral) sentiments is 'neither a safe guide nor a certain protection against error'. Let's stick with empirical, rational arguments and not divert economics into the capricious and often deadly swamp of morality. Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Disclaimer Views expressed above are the author's own.
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Business Standard
4 hours ago
- Business Standard
Tech Wrap July 7: Lumio Arc projectors, HP AI Laptops, WhatsApp threads
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