Paytm—Laid off 3,500+ employees after RBI restrictions, representing 49% of all Indian startup layoffs in 2024
Paytm laid off over 3,500 sales employees between December 2023 and March 2024 after RBI restricted its payments bank subsidiary from onboarding new customers. Despite founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma's January 2024 promise of no layoffs, headcount dropped from 40,000+ to 36,500. In 2024, Paytm accounted for 49% of total Indian startup layoffs. Employees alleged HR pushed 'voluntary' resignations to avoid severance.
Scoring Impact
| Topic | Direction | Relevance | Contribution |
|---|---|---|---|
| Worker Rights | -against | primary | -1.00 |
| Overall incident score = | -0.664 | ||
Score = avg(topic contributions) × significance (high ×1.5) × confidence (0.59)× agency (reactive ×0.75)
Evidence (1 signal)
Laid off 3,500+ employees after RBI restrictions, representing 49% of all Indian startup layoffs in 2024
Paytm laid off over 3,500 sales employees between December 2023 and March 2024 after RBI restricted its payments bank subsidiary from onboarding new customers. Despite founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma's January 2024 promise of no layoffs, headcount dropped from 40,000+ to 36,500. In 2024, Paytm accounted for 49% of total Indian startup layoffs. Employees alleged HR pushed 'voluntary' resignations to avoid severance.