Ban on Tiktok creating way for Indian short video platforms
Tiktok, which had 120 million monthly users in the country, has been banned in India over privacy concerns by the government and is no more available for download. It has been removed from Google Play Store and Apple App Store. For those who don’t know, the government recently banned 59 Chinese apps in the country citing security and privacy concerns. The decision was taken under section 69A of the Information Technology Act. Meity, in an official release, stated that it has banned the apps that are “prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, the security of the state and public order.”
To recall, this isn’t the first time that the Indian government has banned Tiktok but the app was made available soon. But what is more important for us is that the recent ban on the app is helping Indian short video platform to grow big as Indian short video platforms like Chingari, Trell,
Mitron TV have seen a surge in downloads after the ban and can be a turning point for India’s app economy.
Here are a few domestic short video platforms:
While Tiktok was limited to uploading videos and exploring content in a news feed-esque fashion, Bengaluru-based Chingari, in addition to these features allows users to interact with new people, share content with them and also provides trending news, entertainment news, love quotes and more. Chingari pays content creators based on how viral a video becomes. For every video that a user uploads on Chingari, they get points per view which can be redeemed for money.
The Chairman of Mahindra group proudly claimed on Twitter that he has never downloaded Tiktok but will now download Chingari.
“I hadn’t ever downloaded Tiktok but I have just downloaded Chingari...
More power to you...” Anand Mahindra tweeted.
The Bangalore-based founders of the app, Biswatma Nayak and Siddharth Gautam are ecstatic to see the app trending on number one spot at Google Play Store, leaving behind Mitron TV, a Tiktok clone app. It is downloaded more than 10 million on Android.
The home-grown app has raised close to $1 million in seed funding from Angellist, a Us-based online platform for startups, angel investors and job-seekers looking to work in startups.
Mitron TV was launched and then removed from Play store and again listed back. It has emerged as one of the most popular Indian alternatives to Tiktok. The app allows users to reimagine digital entertainment and engagement which is designed for people to showcase their innovative videos online with the theme of light humour. You can create, edit and share your videos as well as browse through a library of top videos across the globe.
By crossing 25 million downloads, earlier this month, Mitron TV app has been one of the most downloaded apps in India during the last two months with 40 million video views per hour. The app has been rapidly enhancing the product with several improvements for the users including an updated video upload process, enhanced audio library, a feature
that enables users to flag any inappropriate content easily.
“We launched Mitron TV well before the unprecedented ban on Chinese apps. Immediately after the ban on Chinese apps, Mitron TV traffic went up 11-fold. Within 10 days of the ban, more than 4.2 billion videos were viewed on Mitron TV which is beyond all expectations we had,” Shivank Agarwal, Co-founder and CEO, Mitrontv
Trell is the go-to platform for users to share their experiences, recommendations, and reviews across various categories including health and fitness, beauty and skincare, travel, movie reviews, cooking, home-décor and much more. The lifestyle vlogging platform allows users to create 3-5-minute videos in their native languages along with a ‘shop’ feature that lets them purchase the products featured in the vlogs. Additionally, the platform also allows users to earn rewards, goodies and vacations through its interface.
The lifestyle community-commerce platform is breaking all the records by witnessing 15 million downloads in a matter of just 8 days, just after the bold decision made by the Indian government to promote Atmanirbhar Bharat.
“The Chinese apps ban has left a vacuum to be filled. Trell is picking up on this opportunity and seeing a lot of organic traction. However, our platform is not an alternative for any of these Chinese platforms. We are much focused on building a tight-knit community in India that engages the audience with meaningful, life-altering lifestyle content,” Pulkit Agarwal, Co-founder, Trell told My
Mobile in an exclusive conversation.
“Since the ban, we have received an overwhelming response from our users where we have seen an influx of over 15 million downloads in a matter of just 8 days. We have now crossed the DAU of Pinterest and Twitter apps in India. Similarly, our creator community has also grown by 5X with over 5.5 lakh+ new creators who have joined our platform and are creating unique content every day,” Agarwal added.
Trell has recently launched its platform in three new languages; Marathi, Kannada and Bengali, making the total count to 8 languages (Additionally, Hindi, English, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam) active so far.
The app’s users can share or view experiences and reviews in categories such as cooking, movie reviews, beauty, and skincare through videos of not more than five minutes.
The Roposo app is a free India-based social media platform designed for people to replace Chinese apps like Tiktok. The app is reportedly have been launched in the year 2014 and it provides users with content that they find very intriguing.
The app features numerous channels that are designed to provide users with contents on a specific topic such as comedy and more. The seamless interface is an add-on for users to create and edit videos creatively using their extensive list of filters.
You can use Roposo app in several languages such as Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Gujarati, Punjabi, Marathi, Bengali, Malayalam, Odiya and Assamese. The channels at the Roposo app are named creatively like Haha TV, Bhakti, Look Good-feel Good, and more. These channels cater to specific topics so that people can enjoy the content they want to see.
Currently, the Roposo app has 50 million downloads and 4.5 stars on Google Play Store, as of the time of writing this article.
Gurugram-based regional language short-video platform Bolo Indya is preparing to help creators monetise their videos from the get-go. Unlike other short-video apps, which are being used for content commerce for brands, Bolo Indya, on the other hand, claims to focus on content commerce for services.
Users can create and share short videos in several languages including Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Bengali, Malayalam, Kannada, Marathi, Punjabi and Odia. Bolo Indya currently has 100,000+ downloads in the country. The app is available on Google Play store but not on Apple App store.