Homegrown mobile applications make quick entry into the market to replace the banned Chinese apps

PUNE: Within eight days of banning Chinese mobile applications, developers, students and startups have immediately jumped into the market with desi apps that are exact replacements. Be it 'Dhak Dhak', replacement for TikTok, 'Scan Karo' for CamScanner or even 'ShareChat' for Shareit, users have quickly moved on to the Indian apps and are experiencing rise in user base in quick time.
Developed by Desktek Infosolution jointly with Kuausmedia Entertainment, ‘Dhak Dhak’ application is a step ahead of Tik Tok.Sagoon and Sridevi Wagh, partners of Kuausmedia Entertainment, said that this app will give opportunities to budding stars under their banner to showcase their talent in the film industry across the country be it Punjabi, Bollywood or south. Sridevi Wagh said, “We will select these artists from the video and users need to put just 15030 seconds of video on the app and the best will be given an opportunity in our projects.” Grooving soundtracks, easily shareable videos on social media platforms, recreating songs and dialogues, scope for comments and likes from the audience, filter effects are some of the highlighting features of ‘Dhak Dhak’.
Cyber expert, Anand Ahuja, said that, “People are now consciously looking out for desi apps. Forget Chinese, the searches on the internet tell that users want to subscribe only to Indian apps, not even the American ones. They are even looking for replacements for online meeting apps like Microsoft Teams, Cisco WebEx, Zoom, Skype and others.”
Another app called ‘Togethring’ developed by a startup Togethring Media Labs, is a completely indigenous Indian app offering all features of banned Chinese apps like WeChat, Help, Shareit together in one single app and offers total social entertainment and utility packages to the users. Chief Executive officer of the startup, Maadhav Bhide, said that, “The app will be a great experience for all types of users be it for entertainment, shopping, ordering food, watching sports together, listening to music or even reading books can be done in this one single app."
Radhika Surve, who was hooked to Tik Tok and discovered her acting talent two years ago on the app said that, “For me, it was very difficult to let go of the Chinese app. I had garnered one million followers and to do away with it was a terrible feeling. But, for me, the nation comes first and we honour the decision of the country. Now, I am on another app developed by my friend from the Sinhagad College of Engineering and slowly i will hit the popularity chart again.”
Right from the launch about 2 months ago, the Mitron app has seen very strong consumer adoption as users appreciate that the content on their platform caters to local community standards. Ever since the Indian government announced a ban on several Chinese apps, the daily traffic jumped up beyond all expectations.
Founded by two computer science engineers, Shivank Agarwal an alumnus of IIT Roorkee and Anish Khandelwal, alumnus of Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology, the Mitron app is a short-form social video app that allows users to create, upload, view, and share entertaining short videos. Agarwal said, "It took us 70 days to cross the 10million (1cr) milestone and the growth has been entirely organic with zero marketing spend. In just three days after the ban on several Chinese apps, our total downloads more than doubled. Presently, we have 22 million (2.2cr) downloads.