India stands to lose some of its biggest talents, says Polygon CEO

India produces some of the top tech talents globally, but those talents could be relocating to other countries.

Sandeep Nailwa, the CEO of Polygon, the largest Layer-1 protocol on the Ethereum network, has warned that the cryptocurrency brain drain in India is crazy. He made this statement during an interview with Bloomberg.

According to the CEO, India’s indecision on whether to embrace digital assets or not is resulting in thousands of developers, investors and entrepreneurs leaving for places with more friendly regulation. Nailwa said;

“The brain drain is absolutely crazy. “I want to live in India and promote the Web3 ecosystem. But overall, the way the regulatory uncertainty is there and how big Polygon has become, it doesn’t make sense for us or for any team to expose their protocols to local risks.”

India is home to more than 15 million cryptocurrency users, one of the largest in the world. However, the country has been stuck in a regulatory debate regarding cryptocurrencies over the past few years.

The Indian government introduced a 30% tax on cryptocurrency transactions, but the general regulation of digital assets remains unclear. 

At the time, Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the government was yet to make a final decision on whether to ban virtual coins or regulate them. However, she said;

“Many Indians have seen a future in it, therefore I see a possibility for revenue in it. The government imposes a 30% tax on digital coin transactions.”

Nailwa warned countries worldwide that they stand to lose more talents if they don’t figure out how to regulate the cryptocurrency space. He added that;

“Countries will keep losing new talent capabilities until the time they figure it out. Crypto is very disruptive in the sense it has a potential not only to disrupt the concept of money but also the concept of government itself.”