Moved my MNC HQ from New York to Gujarat to "save money"—now moving back because the corruption and bureaucracy are a living hell.
I am an Indian co-founder of a multinational company originally based in New York. A while back, I figured that if I moved our operations to India, we’d benefit immensely from lower labor costs, skilled talent, and a solid backend team. So, I made the decision to move our HQ from NY to Gujarat.
Because our business strictly exports products to multiple countries globally, we needed to get registered with the Customs office and a Customs House Agent (CHA). That is when the nightmare began.
The sheer amount of endless bureaucracy just to export products from India is insane. First, I applied for GST, and they demanded a mountain of documents. Then came opening the bank account, getting the IEC, AD code, Icegate registration—the list just kept going.
And it didn't stop there. I literally had to submit 2 kilograms of paperwork to the Customs office. After all that, they casually told me it would take 5 to 6 months just to open our customs account. After waiting out 2 months in limbo, I called for an update. They basically hinted that there was an "alternative route" to speed things up. They demanded a 5-digit bribe to get the account opened within 12 hours. I was completely shocked, but because I desperately needed to get the business moving, I agreed. True to their word, the moment the cash changed hands, the account was active.
But the extortion is never-ending. Now that we are exporting, a team member has to physically visit the local Customs House for every shipment. The officers there openly demand 3-digit cash bribes for every single parcel. If you refuse, they threaten to throw your shipment into "secondary inspection." In secondary inspection, they can legally hold your goods for 1 to 2 years without giving you a single answer. To save their businesses from ruin, every single exporter there just pays the bribe to clear their shipments.
The headache of dealing with this constant corruption is unbearable. I have officially decided to pack up and move all of our operations back to New York, USA. Honestly, I would much rather pay high, honest salaries to American employees than give a single rupee in bribes to these corrupt Sarkari babus.
Opening a business in the USA is incredibly simple. You fill out a few details online, and they hand you a business registration certificate within 24 hours. That single certificate lets you do everything—import, export, open bank accounts, you name it.
Meanwhile, in India, I had to drive to a different government department every single day for proofs, documents, physical signatures, and approvals.
Ease of doing business? What a joke. I am never doing business in India again.