Talk can be cheap. Especially when you audaciously claim to be hatching a
plan to make a smartphone for Rs 251. From being accused of relabelling
an existing brand (Adcom Ikon) to plotting a Ponzi scam, Mohit and
Dhaarna Goel heard it all over the past week. The cynicism and
suspicions were perhaps justified — the company the Goels have founded,
Ringing Bells, and the handset they tom-tom as the world's cheapest,
Freedom 251, is an outrageous gambit. The cheapest smartphones in the
world today — Chinese handsets, of course — are priced at Rs
2,200-2,500. Selling one for almost a tenth of that price is either a
lie, a delusion — or dazzlingly disruptive.
Talk can be cheap, but it may well be the Goels' mantra — or, more precisely, the handset that you talk into. The husband-wife duo who got married in January this year allude to their lack of pedigree and profile for the dollops of scepticism directed at them.
"Jisne Nano banayi uske paas achha support thaa, maine Rs 251 mein smartphone banayi, mere paas support nahin hai (The one who made the Nano had ample support, but I am making a smartphone for Rs 251 and have no support)," rues 29-year-old Mohit, who was born in Uttar Pradesh's Shamli district and comes from a family of dry-fruit traders. "I am with my husband and support his dream," pipes in Dhaarna.
He'll need more than that. After all, the man who, at different phases in his youth, contemplated cricketing and acting careers, is now talking about "bridging the digital divide in India by making smartphones accessible to all". A recent PEW research report placed India at the bottom in smartphone ownership, at 17% of the country's adults; Brazil is at 41%, China at 58% and South Korea is on top with 88%.
On Saturday, PTI reported that the Enforcement Directorate had begun a probe into Ringing Bells' financials, although company officials told Magazine that no summons or notices had reached them at the time of writing. The company has also come under the scanner of the Income-Tax department, and the Telecom Ministry had sought a clarification from the firm for marketing the Freedom 251 smartphone without the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) certification. The Goels say they have replied to the ministry's queries, although they did not share the details of those replies with Magazine.
Talk can be cheap, but it may well be the Goels' mantra — or, more precisely, the handset that you talk into. The husband-wife duo who got married in January this year allude to their lack of pedigree and profile for the dollops of scepticism directed at them.
"Jisne Nano banayi uske paas achha support thaa, maine Rs 251 mein smartphone banayi, mere paas support nahin hai (The one who made the Nano had ample support, but I am making a smartphone for Rs 251 and have no support)," rues 29-year-old Mohit, who was born in Uttar Pradesh's Shamli district and comes from a family of dry-fruit traders. "I am with my husband and support his dream," pipes in Dhaarna.
He'll need more than that. After all, the man who, at different phases in his youth, contemplated cricketing and acting careers, is now talking about "bridging the digital divide in India by making smartphones accessible to all". A recent PEW research report placed India at the bottom in smartphone ownership, at 17% of the country's adults; Brazil is at 41%, China at 58% and South Korea is on top with 88%.
On Saturday, PTI reported that the Enforcement Directorate had begun a probe into Ringing Bells' financials, although company officials told Magazine that no summons or notices had reached them at the time of writing. The company has also come under the scanner of the Income-Tax department, and the Telecom Ministry had sought a clarification from the firm for marketing the Freedom 251 smartphone without the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) certification. The Goels say they have replied to the ministry's queries, although they did not share the details of those replies with Magazine.
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