Hacker News Reader

>There are a lot of small shopkeepers in India. There is no reason to believe they've been stabbing and shooting their competition

Have you ever owned a non IT business? I am in India and my friends who have successful shops received death threats many times. One even sold his hotel because his son was getting kidnapped all time.

View on HN

> One even sold his hotel

When I say 'small shopkeepers', I don't mean people who are rich enough to own hotels. I mean mom and pop grocery shops or the neighbourhood tea stall.

Sure, other small shop owners have to pay bribe to food inspector in North India.

Yes, that's true. There's all kinds of extortion by corrupt cops and government officers. But these shopkeepers are by and large not mafiosi who have to muscle out the competition.

My neighbor is part of Sand Mafia and my last cable guy got his throat sliced by competitor who now owns the whole local cable network.

I wouldn't be surprised if the local cable network is ultimately owned by one of the local politicians. That seems to be the norm throughout India.

But these are not the kind of small businesses I was talking about.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com