Sunny Ray sits down with Ajeet Khurana, former CEO of Zebpay and one of India's most recognized crypto industry figures, for a wide ranging conversation about the people and stories behind Bitcoin rather than its price. Khurana traces his journey from becoming a stock market investor at age 12 using his father's money, through decades of unconventional investments, into angel investing starting in 1998. He explains his skeptical first look at Bitcoin in 2014, the two years and roughly 500 hours he spent studying it, and his first purchase in 2016. The conversation turns to his appointment as Zebpay CEO in March 2018, just 13 days before the Reserve Bank of India issued its landmark circular effectively banning banks from servicing crypto businesses, forcing him into crisis mode almost overnight. Khurana reflects candidly on the industry's fractured response, the lessons for entrepreneurs navigating regulatory gray zones, and why he believes artificial intelligence, unlike most past technological shifts, may concentrate rather than distribute power.
A former Zebpay CEO recounts becoming India's crypto crisis manager just 13 days into the job.
How did you first get into investing?
I entered the stock market in October 1982 at age 12, using my father's money because he had poor eyesight and couldn't fill out forms or read prospectuses. I kept helping him with IPOs until 1985, then at 15 bought stock with my own pocket money. Since I had no family to support, I always chased high risk, high return investments across stocks, comics, stamps, art and coins.
How and when did you get into Bitcoin?
I only started looking at Bitcoin in 2014, which felt late even then. I initially dismissed it as something nerdy weirdos believed in, but the price graph kept pulling me back. I spent about two years and roughly 500 hours studying it, including a Coursera course by Princeton, before finally buying about 1,000 rupees worth in September 2016.
Can you explain the RBI circular and what it meant for crypto in India?
In March 2018, the Reserve Bank of India barred any entity it licensed, banks, NBFCs, card networks, wallets and payment gateways, from letting money flow in or out of crypto. Exchanges couldn't hold bank accounts and retail customers had their accounts shut. Bitcoin itself was never officially declared illegal, but blocking banking access effectively banned crypto in practice.
What was it like becoming Zebpay's CEO right as this happened?
I became head of the Blockchain and Cryptocurrency Committee in January 2018, then Zebpay hired me as CEO in March 2018. Thirteen days into the job, the RBI circular hit. I don't fully buy into the peacetime versus wartime CEO narrative, but if forced to use it, I went from a peacetime CEO to a wartime one almost overnight.
How did the crypto industry respond to the ban, and what lessons stand out for entrepreneurs?
At the time there were five major players, including Zebpay, Unocoin, Coinsecure, BTCXIndia and Coinome. We tried to cobble together a joint legal strategy to get the circular stayed, but someone took incoherent independent legal action and it hurt everyone. I wish the industry had been as united as it claims to be. Bodies like Nasscom did enormous good for Indian software, and crypto needs that same maturity.
Do you think the AI hype narrative is different from what you saw with earlier technologies?
Every major technological shift I've watched, cloud computing, mobile internet, e-commerce, digital wallets, has been democratizing, giving power to people. AI worries me because it could concentrate power with whoever controls the data and models, turning them into overlords rather than enablers. I don't think AI is hype, I think it will be civilization altering, but we don't yet know which direction it takes.
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