The world’s fastest growing Social Token App, Chingari unveiled its’ first-ever crypto token, ‘$GARI’ at a public event at Taj Lands’ End, Mumbai today at the hands of reigning film megastar and the brand ambassador of the tech start-up, Salman Khan. Marking a massive feat of sorts, Chingari becomes the first social network in India to have issued crypto tokens with this unveil.
Also present at the glittering launch party were Bollywood actresses Vaani Kapoor and Sonnalli Seygall, alongwith the co-founders of Chingari – Mr. Sumit Ghosh (Chief Executive Officer), Mr. Deepak Salvi (Chief Operating Officer), Mr. Biswatma Nayak (Head Of Engineering) and Mr. Aditya Kothari.
Recently the popular Indian short-video sharing platform completed a funding round of over $19 million from more than 30 venture funds and individual investors. The funding will help the startup to build ‘$GARI’ with Solana, the fastest-growing ecosystem in crypto technology. With the funds raised, the company will test blockchain live, Chingari Integration beta, and the upcoming $GARI token sale. Some of the biggest firms that participated in the funding round include Republic Crypto, Galaxy Digital, Alameda Research, Solana Capital, Valor Equity Partners, Kraken, Blackpine, NGC, Coinfund, LD Capital, Borderless Capital, AU21, Cultur3 Capital, Long Term Ventures, Afton Capital, and CSP DAO, among others.
With a vision of establishing ‘social tokens’ as the future of community platforms, $GARI aims to transform the creator ecosystem of the Indian sub-continent by enabling creators to set up their ecommerce space that includes physical merchandise, NFT creations and the ability for the fan community to fund their favorite artists.
Chingari’s brand ambassador Salman Khan states, “The Creators are shaping the future of entertainment. With the incorporation of GARI rewards programme, the creators will further get motivated to create newer and more engaging videos on the Chingari app. It’s going to be an interesting journey hereon.”
Mr. Sumit Ghosh, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Chingari informed that with the launch of $GARI, Chingari is poised to become the trailblazer of social infotainment platforms and will forefront the Indian crypto blitzkrieg.
“Chingari is the go-to destination for the young millennials, including some of the country’s finest creators. While the creator economy is burgeoning and creators are becoming a pivotal force of this revolution, we believe that creators should be in charge of how the platform is taking shape. With the introduction of $GARI, we are vesting the decision-making powers back in the hands of the users and enabling content monetization to become more mainstream in India. Chingari’s blockchain platform will allow users to obtain tokens for creating or watching content. The idea is to monetize creators’ talent with an ethical amount of money and empower them via a social platform. Chingari through its token $GARI wants to make this vision possible. We are certain $GARI will be a groundbreaking invention for the Indian digital and creator economy.” elaborates Sumit Ghosh.
Founded in November 2018 by Sumit Ghosh, Deepak Salvi, Aditya Kothari and Biswatma Nayak, Chingari lets users download and upload short videos and shop for merchandise within the app, among other things. The Bengaluru-based rival of Instagram Reels, MX Takatak, Josh and Moj boasts of 50 million monthly active users and 78 million downloads to date and the co-founders are confident that it will be India’s fastest growing ‘Social Token App. Since its redesign in June 2020, Chingari worked to fill the vacuum created by TikTok’s ban in India. Ever since, the number of Chingari users claims to have increased exponentially, surpassing milestones of 100,000, 1 million, 10 million, and then 50 million — all in just six months. Spurring its growth is the creator-centric model, attracting talent, and generating intriguing content for its nearly 80 million users.
