This was my iPay Dukanline team. Every one of them. When we started in 2013.
Oracle sent 30,000 termination emails on March 31.

The math is simple.
Every month Oracle paid salaries.
Now that same money pays for AI data centers.
People out. Servers in.
Same bill. Different future.

I understand that decision.
I’ve been there.

In 2019, when I wound down Dukanline, I had to let go of people who joined me on day one.

Every rupee in that company was mine.
No external investors.
No board to share the blame with.
Just millions of my own money. Gone.

And still… I had to walk in and tell people their jobs were over.

The easy thing would have been an email.
Keep distance. Make it clean. Move on.

I couldn’t do that.

I sat with each of them.
Told them exactly what had happened financially.
No spin. No corporate language.
Just the truth.

Then I gave every one of them two months salary.

I had just lost millions of my own money.
And my first instinct was still —
how do I give them enough time to land safely.

Years later those same people still call.

Not for jobs. Not for favors.

To wish me happy birthday.

But there is a difference between cutting costs and abandoning people.

Every founder will face this moment one day.
Gods grace that you never have to.
But if that day comes ….

Show up.

How you send off your people is more important than.. how you onboard them.