In a bid to boycott Chinese imports. A list of 59 apps banned by the Indian government is released which are operating in India to be banned. The Ban of the Chinese app affected the Indian economy.
TikTok impact on Indian economy is limited, however, the app has a huge fan base in India.
The decision to ban 59 Chinese app in India is a strong step by India. However, the ban doesn’t affect India given the alternatives it has. But, the move is a clear latch on the Chinese dream to capture young Indian internet market.
India, after the digital boom, saw its internet growing at the highest rate in the world. At present, India has 800 million users. Rates are cheapest in the world and half of the users are below 25.
In April, the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade made it compulsory for the Foreign Direct Investment from China to take approval. This move is seen as a step to control Chinese opportunistic acquisitions during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Ban of Chinese products in India will affect Indian economy adversely. China can challenge this in the World Trade Organisation. One of the effective ways seen is ban technology.
Just 10 days ago, the Press Information Bureau Fact Check, on Twitter, denied news that the government had prohibited some apps to be available on Play store.
With the FDI approval norms and now the ban of Chinese app would make it more difficult for the Chinese companies to invest in Indian startups.
In the last 4 years, Chinese investors like Tencent, Alibaba, and Hillhouse capital invested over $5.5 billion in Indian start-ups. 16 out of the 29 Indian unicorns have at least one Chinese investor on the board, according to Venture Intelligence, the private equity tracker.
TikTok has 120 million active users and currently the most downloaded app in India. This huge user base, mostly among youth is shaping the culture, especially among the rustic zones.
The TikTok app which allows the user to create TikTok short videos and overlay voice or music surpassed 2 billion downloads globally; of which 30 per cent came from India, according to the Sensor Tower Inc, market intelligence firm. However, the TikTok app’s income in India is less when compared to China and the US markets.
TikTok was seeing a clear growth in India along with increasing its workforce, according to RoC filing by ByteDance in recent months.
In May 2019, the government ban Chinese app downloads for two weeks after the Madras High Court ruled that the app could expose children to explicit content. Later, TikTok appealed to the court and the order was reversed. However, now the ban of Chinese app is set to stay longer.
After the government announced the ban of Chinese app last night, Indian alternatives to TikTok seen increasing downloads. Chingari, a homegrown app claims to be complete alternative garnered over 2.5 million downloads.