Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma talks about Paytm, expectations from budget

Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma at an event, admitted how the company should have taken care of its responsibilities better, while also talking about his expectations from the 2024 union budget.

“At a professional level, we should have done better and there is no secret about it,” Sharma said while speaking at the seventh JITO Incubation and Innovation Foundation (JIIF), an annual innovation conclave in Delhi. “We had responsibilities and we should have fulfilled them much better. We learnt our lesson.”

What were the issues at Paytm?
This comes nearly five months after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) placed restrictions, citing non-compliance, on Paytm Payments Bank, an associate company that comes under One97 Communications.

The RBI barred it from accepting deposits, credit transactions or top-ups in any customer accounts, wallets, and FASTags, from March 15 onwards.

This made operations for the payments bank come to a halt, and reduced sales employee headcount in the last quarter of the financial year 2023-24 fall by about 3,500, according to an Economic Times report.

What happened at Paytm afterwards?
One97 Communications, the parent company of Paytm had also laid off an undisclosed number of employees in June.

When asked why employees are leaving Paytm, Sharma however said “All is well and all is rocking,” a Business Standard report read.

This comes after allegations of the company forcing employees to unlawfully resign without severance pay, following which, employees filed complaints with the Ministry of Labour and Employment.

What does Sharma expect from the 2024 Union Budget?
Sharma talked about how he would like the government to support startups and small businesses, focus on enhancing the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) platform and amend the overall e-commerce policy in the country, according to the Mint report.