Transformer by Mint | WazirX’s return, India’s AI law, and a ₹1 data plan

The virtual chat, as far as I remember, was fairly pleasant—cryptocurrencies were having their breakout moment in India, and Shetty, through recognizable television spots, was fast capturing the mind share of crypto investors in India.

Fast forward to now, and WazirX has become synonymous with the dark side of cryptocurrencies—especially as the hack revealed that WazirX was, in fact, an offshore entity with its core properties based in Singapore.

On Friday, I wrote at length on the once-massive crypto exchange, after a fresh chat with Shetty. He sought to explain how the company has “rebalanced" user investments, and plans to return balances over the next three years.

Interestingly, social media was abuzz with users alleging cases of mistrust by the exchange—with most users whom we spoke with stating that WazirX did not return 85% of their actual investments.

Claims of returns varied from 10% to 40%.

None of this really helps cryptocurrency firms in India in the collective sense. In 2022, when taxes were imposed on all crypto trades and transactions, investments by regular users decreased by over 90%. Now, with a hack and a staggered return of the hard-earned investments made by users, WazirX stands at a moment in time where winning back user trust will be the biggest challenge. Industry folks, such as CoinSwitch founder Ashish Singhal and Giottus chief Vikram Subburaj, agree too.

In a heavy, tech-laden post-Diwali week, here’s Mint’s 1,000 words on the return of what was once India’s largest crypto exchange, what the top executives have to say, and what the biggest challenges are for the industry.

Furore over tracking AI deepfakes

In other news, the IT ministry released a draft set of guidelines last week on how to regulate artificial intelligence, purely from the perspective of harm. The target: taking out a rising volume of deepfakes on internet platforms.

Now, industry stakeholders are largely divided on the regulations. While we all agree that an anti-misinformation law is important, creators have flagged that a 10% watermark rule that the Indian government has suggested is rather difficult to implement.

Others have stated that there’s no nuanced definition that segregates content generated by AI, and edited by AI. Still more people said a targeted curbing of AI was the need of the hour—instead of ‘all’ AI content being flagged in a set manner.

All of this has raised debates within India’s tech policy circles on what India’s first attempt to regulate AI will eventually look like. There are multiple takes to consider here, and until 6 November, the Centre is taking public comments on how you and I can use AI online, what kind of content needs to be flagged, what the right measures of regulation should be, and who should be liable for offending the law.

Here are the six most important questions (and their answers) on India’s first AI regulation that you need to know.

A ₹1 data plan has all telcos irked

Starting 15 October, BSNL, the state-run telco, began offering a 30-day prepaid recharge plan priced at—you guessed it— ₹1. For the solitary rupee, users will get access to 2GB of 4G data everyday, along with unlimited telephony and 100 SMS messages a month. Now, as it turns out, other telcos in India have a sizeable problem with it.

Operators have flagged to the Centre that BSNL’s plan is anti-competitive, because it is undercutting industry pricing to rope in new users, or make users port to BSNL from other networks. Industry stakeholders, however, state that there’s nothing illegal happening—BSNL is not a market leader, and promotional tariffs, such as this ₹1 plan, are legally allowed by the Centre too.

The reason why this story is important is because of the way India’s telecom industry has grown over the years. In 2016, the advent of Reliance Jio sparked a tariff war that wiped out multiple telecom operators from the market—turning it essentially into a duopoly between Jio and Airtel. Now, telcos are highlighting court rulings to state that the very same action should not be allowed. It is all a bit of a corporate circus, one that is sure to evolve over time.

At the same time, Reliance Jio, India’s largest telecom operator, has decided not to hike its mobile telephony and data tariffs. In its recent call with analysts, the company stated that it will seek to increase profitability by nudging users to consume more. Is Jio’s move linked in some ways to BSNL’s aggressive promo tariff? Is the Reliance group behemoth wary of the government operator? Jatin Grover from the Mint newsroom brings you all the details.

More doom for IT?

Last week, our IT correspondent Jas Bardia underlined a key point as most IT services firms wrapped up earnings: will this fiscal year really be any better than a miserable FY25 that the $300-billion IT sector mostly endured? It turns out that the question is a rather tough one.

For now, the markers all point to a difficult second half of the year for many reasons. India’s IT services firms, famous the world over for being a global back-office of operations across sectors, thrive on mammoth deals at scale. It is this strategy that most firms have built the core of their businesses upon.

Now, though, things have changed. Large deals are scarce, AI is changing everything for everyone, and more geopolitical divides mean that visas and foreign placements are under pressure, too. Jas sifted through the numbers from India’s top six IT firms for the first half of the fiscal, spoke with a number of analysts, and produced a guidance dossier of what to expect from this mammoth sector, which millions of investors bet upon everyday even now.

On the sidelines of yet another difficult fiscal year, Jas also spoke with experts to decode how and why the promoters of Infosys—India’s second-largest tech firm—are opting out of the company’s $2-billion share buyback scheme. The answer: tax liability, which turns out could be higher than what the promoters would earn if they participated in the scheme. Here’s your full lowdown.

Remember Akai, JVC and Olympus?

If the above names ring a bell, you’re likely born at least in the early 1990s—and grew up in an era of boxy televisions, low-resolution portable music players, and the first crop of compact point-and-shoot digital cameras with ultra-low resolution video cameras. My first-ever camera, in fact, was an Olympus digital camera—which could only record 0.3MP videos, without any audio.

Those days are nearly three decades in the past. During this time, these old brands faded from prominence as an onslaught of Chinese competitors brought forth devices that were flashier, more cutting-edge, and made more modern technologies a common affair.

Last week, our startups correspondent Sakshi Sadashiv pegged an electronics report on the return of Olympus (now branded as OM System) to speak about how these once-iconic brands are reentering India, driven by the growing expanse of its electronics market. Akai is targeting ACs, while JVC is licensing smart TVs under its name.

But, Sakshi’s report isn’t just a nostalgia drive—it is a commentary on rising competition in India’s electronics market, which signals two things: one, that there is clear growth in the industry; and two, an upward surge in consumption patterns is expected soon.

In other news: Google Pixel 10 Pro Fold, and ChatGPT Atlas

I also spent some time with the latest foldable smartphone in India—the Google Pixel 10 Pro Fold. While I found its predecessor, the Pixel 9 Pro Fold, to be the single-best smartphone in the world at the time, this year’s rendition appeared a bit… stoic. The reason for this is Samsung likely out-innovating Google on foldable phones this year with a clear direction ahead—one that felt more reasonable for consumers, and not just as a tech showcase. If you’re interested in knowing how one of the most expensive smartphones in India fares, here’s my piece for Lounge.

That said, India’s smartphone market appears to be continuing with its struggles. Last week, I reported that despite a 15% surge in Diwali sales over last year, India’s smartphone market is likely to remain stagnant this year as well. The reason: a complete lack of organic demand, and a drive for premium smartphones not sustaining beyond a while.

Finally, we also spoke about OpenAI’s shiny new agentic AI browser, ChatGPT Atlas. With this, OpenAI is creating the hallowed ecosystem play that others such as Apple and Google have been known for. This ecosystem, as it seems, is of AI services that work in every phase of your life—from content recommendations to search, commerce and browsing.

But, OpenAI’s AI browser play is now also about taking on the might of Google. This, experts state, makes for one of the most exciting battles in global tech—harking back to Windows versus Mac in the early 2000s, and Android versus iOS from the 2010s.

With this, we wrap up what was a tumultuous week in tech, even as the festive season hangover continues across most markets.

Transformer by Mint is a weekly newsletter that brings India’s most important and interesting technology updates under one umbrella. As the world transforms with every day of innovation, Transformer will keep a tab on the impact that technologies will make in each of our lives. Published every week, the newsletter brings some of India’s tech landscape’s most insightful coverages until date.