1/ We have a very poor understanding of privilege in India. This has far-reaching effects on the products we design and build.

I am writing this in English. You are able to read it. Congrats - we are both privileged.

2/ The Indian middle class is like bigfoot. Imaginary. We do not belong to this mythical group. In fact, this group has never existed throughout history (and was a figment of Hrishikesh Mukherjee's imagination). Say to yourself - I am rich. And privileged.

3/ Some data:

Did you study in an English medium school? We only have around 225K of these schools in India and only 25 million Indians (~2%) have studied in them.

4/ Do you have at least one parent who went to college? You are one of 10 million Indians (sub 1%). Around 120 million Indians have a college degree - most of them graduated in the last 10-15 years. So not our parents' generation.

5/ If you have taken a domestic flight in the last one year, or purchased anything online ever, or own a credit card you are respectively in 5%, 4% and 3% of India's population.

6/ Oh, and if you make more than USD 10/ day (roughly INR 2.5 lacs/ year) you are one amongst 80 million Indians (6%). If you feel you are not in the same economic class as your food delivery guy - congrats - you are actually amongst the super-rich in India.

7a/ We all love the underdog narrative about ourselves.

"My dad walked 5 miles to school every single day."

"I studied 14 hours a day to get into an IIT."

"Nothing was just handed to me. I worked hard for this."

7b/ ... Pfft. I am a tall fair man, born into a brahmin family, where both parents went to college. The above three quotes (previous tweet) are statements I've made often. And yet, in reality, everything was handed to me in a silver platter. And to you.

8/ In any recovery program, the first step is acceptance. While some of you will be nodding along to everything you have read so far, others will be in vehement disagreement with me. Guess what - the very fact that you have an option to disagree means you are privileged.

9/ In this potent mix, throw in the fact that pretty much every product company in India is made up of individuals like you and me. Forget making for India. We are making for the 1 to 6% of India that is like us. We have no understanding of the remaining 94%.

10/ We can either accept this and make our peace with it or we can decide to do something about it. The former is easy. For most companies - the top 6% of India is a fairly large and valuable market. You can spend your career building for this segment.

11/ But if you truly want to build for India - travel to the hinterlands. Connect with real people. And quickly come to terms with your privilege.

Do wait for the country to recover before you do this. Happy Monday.

/fin