It’s now a well-known fact that online payment portal Paytm benefited a lot from Indian government’s move to demonetize old Rs. 500 and Rs. 1000 notes.
While the other companies are still trying to catch up with them, Paytm is already moving to the next stage and opening their own online Bank.
The majority of this success Paytm owes to the fact that they had an early mover’s advantage as they had already set up digital payment system between customers and retailers months before government’s move.
With this, they not only became the torch bearer of the Digital drive that India is currently seeing but also had a huge advantage over their competitors.
But all that it seems has gone to Paytm CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma’s head as he on January 17 went on stage and openly thrashed his competition.

Paytm CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma Money Life
Further even diplomacy seems to have taken high ground for Sharma as he not only trashed his competition but did it by openly abusing them and saying that even in 10 years they didn’t match up to his hard work.
“Ye hai Paytm. Jo hamare saath nahi hai woh royenge. Ek saal mein woh kiya jo unhone 10 saal mein nahi kiya! 2017 will be ours. Kaise nahi hoga? Kaleja diya, jaan di, khoon diya, saara kuch laga diya. B******* Humne kuch socha, humne kuch socha, humne kuch socha aur saala doosron ki pant geeli nahi hui toh kya socha! Ab koi India mein hamari taraf nahi dekh raha, kyon? Hamare ko saara desh nahi, saari duniya dekh rahi hai!
The above roughly translates to,
Advertisement“This is Paytm. Who will not be with us will regret it. What we did in one year, others couldn’t achieve in 10 years. 2017 will be ours. How will it not be? We have given our heart and soul to it. We thought about a plan and our competitors got flummoxed. We are unstoppable in India. Forget India, the entire world is looking at us.”
Here is what happened,
Since demonetization Paytm has witnessed nearly three times the growth in overall traffic and added more than 20 million new users.
While many have criticised Sharma for his arrogance and conduct, OML chief Vijay Nair has supported his namesake and said he said nothing he couldn’t relate to and that there is no “code of conduct” set for CEO’s to behave and act a certain way.
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1/ Just saw this @vijayshekhar video. I thought I’d have nothing to say but damn I am wrong. I could relate to every bit of that joy, the…
— Vijay Nair (@vijay_nair) January 18, 2017
2/ …high (teetotallers get high too, I can vouch for it), khushi ka aggression after a great year. As someone trying to run a company,…
— Vijay Nair (@vijay_nair) January 18, 2017
3/ …we’ve been conditioned to this default setting of what CEO’s are supposed to be, act like, behave. Firstly, which CEO commission…
— Vijay Nair (@vijay_nair) January 18, 2017
4/ …set this code of conduct? Bandh karo saalon ko. Give me a plain speaking, straight shooting guy to deal with any day compared to …-
— Vijay Nair (@vijay_nair) January 18, 2017
5/ tedXstandyspeaker- motivational quote spewing- jargon-ulti-fellows. And for everybody who wants every business leader to be
— Vijay Nair (@vijay_nair) January 18, 2017