In a land like India where Atithi Devo Bhava (Guest is equal to God) is the mantra, Amazon’s founder Jeff Bezos was not given a very warm welcome here.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is on a mini India visit. As he landed in Delhi, he went to pay respect to Mahatma Gandhi’s Samadhi at Raj Ghat. He also posted a picture of him paying respects at Raj Ghat on his Twitter handle.
“Just landed in India and spent a beautiful afternoon paying my respects to someone who truly changed the world. Live as if you were to die tomorrow, learn as if you were to live forever” –Mahatma Gandhi” were the lines on his Twitter page.
He got trolled after posting this on his Twitter page; he was termed as a ‘brutal boss’ who also has a cheapskate way of treating his employees. He was accused of paying his employees a peanut salary.
His business trip to India not only gained him negative responses on his Twitter handle but he was not welcomed on Indian soil either. Before his arrival, there were placards displaying “Jeff, Go Back”, protested by business owners in more than 300 cities.
Right before he arrived, India’s antitrust body, CCI has opened an investigation into Amazon’s business practices after small traders complained about how much power the company has over the market.
Bezos’s Amazon has been blamed for undercutting business owners in terms of pricing, subsequently driving them out of business. The Confederation of All India Traders has gone so far as to describe Bezos as an ‘economic terrorist.’
Despite all this, Bezos expressed optimism for Amazon’s business in the country, and said in the 21st century, he thinks, “the most important alliance is going to be between India – the world’s oldest democracy and the United States – the world’s largest democracy”.
Bezos also announced during the talk that Amazon would be investing $1 billion in digitizing India’s small- and medium sized businesses. By 2025, Amazon aims to export $10 billion worth of goods from India.
