Three trends suggest India is adding short to its video-first market

Three trends are making short video apps the YouTube of internet

Pavan Rathod loves making rangolis, the art form that makes colourful patterns on the floor or tabletop. Gods and goddesses, flowers, the letters of someone’s name — he can make a rangoli of anything. “Shauk hai (it is a hobby),” he says.

By the time Rathod was 18, he was being invited to homes, clubs, and hotels to make rangolis. Soon he could make a living from it.

Then came TikTok. Starting with his first post on the short-video app in 2018, Rathod quickly gained 1.2 million followers. By the time India banned TikTok in June 2020, Rathod was familiar with the