The many troubles at BluSmart; Priyanka K Mohan on Yakshagana dance

Hello,

A tariff war is raging around the world. 

Some countries are exploring a workaround to US tariffs, including India, which is reviewing demands to cut import duties on farm goods, including pecans, pulses, and non-GMO soybeans, as well as dried distilled grains soluble. 

In addition, the country is also angling to fuel its energy-hungry economy as it considers scrapping the import tax on US LNG. 

For other countries, appeasement is off the table. China has vowed to take countermeasures against US tariffs, even as China's President Xi Jinping called a meeting of CEOs to assuage fears that this will stunt growth in the world’s second-largest economy. 

Canada, too, has already slapped the US with several retaliatory measures, with more planned for next month. 

Meanwhile, the world of art and filmmaking is being rocked by a question: can someone own an art style?

The new ChatGPT tool, which lets users transform photos into the style used by Ghibli Founder Hayao Miyazaki, has raised ethical concerns about AI tools trained on copyrighted creative works. 

OpenAI has been largely mum on the material used to train the model. But this has dredged up old critiques by Miyazaki himself, one in which he notably called AI art “an insult to life itself.”

In today’s newsletter, we will talk about 

• The many troubles at BluSmart
• Priyanka K Mohan on Yakshagana dance
• Code Effort recycling cigarette waste

Here’s your trivia for today: What evolutionary trait have some African elephants developed as a direct result of intensive poaching?

Electric Mobility

The many troubles at BluSmart

Sign up for our exclusive newsletters.

Subscribe to check out our popular newsletters.

* indicates mandatory fields

EV ride-hailing app BluSmart will deploy around 300 electric cabs on US-based rival Uber’s platform as part of an experiment, amidst mounting troubles at the company, a person familiar with the matter told YourStory.

The timing of the deployment coincides with BluSmart’s funding woes and the impending exits of senior executives. Top management personnel, including BluSmart’s CEO Anirudh Arun, Chief Business Officer Tushar Garg, and Chief Technology Officer Rishabh Sood, have handed in their resignations and are currently serving their respective notice periods.

Key takeaways:

• This is not the first time BluSmart had an arrangement with a ride-hailing company; it had a similar experiment with Rapido, wherein its drivers could accept Rapido bookings via the BluSmart driver app.
• However, with liquidity challenges at Gensol—the company that had leased the majority of BluSmart’s cabs—coming to light, Rapido is reported to have pulled out of this arrangement, and BluSmart has stopped deploying its cabs on the platform.
• Meanwhile, Refex Green Mobility has abandoned its plans to take over vehicles from Gensol Engineering, adding to the woes of the renewable energy company. Chennai-based Refex Industries had informed the public bourses on January 16 that its subsidiary would take over 2,997 electric four-wheelers from Gensol.

Top Funding Deals of the Week

Startup: BluPine Energy

Amount: Rs 1,787 crore

Round: Restructured financing

Startup: Findi

Amount: Rs 243 Cr

Round: Institutional placement

Startup: Apna Mart

Amount: Rs 214.5 Cr

Round: Equity and debt

SheSparks

Priyanka K Mohan on Yakshagana dance

Priyanka K Mohan, Co-founder of Tvarita Arts Collective India, is changing Yakshagana’s rulebook and working on preserving similar endangered indigenous art forms in India. The dance form, which originated in coastal Karnataka, blends storytelling, music and dance, drawing the audience into a mythical world.

“My earliest memories have been filled with chande (drums used in Yakshagana), the rustles of its colourful costume, and the rhythmic movements of Yakshagana,” recalls Mohan, a Yakshagana artist, teacher and cultural ambassador, at SheSparks 2025. 

No gender in dance:

• Yakshagana has been culturally male-dominated, but in recent times, many women have made their entry into the art form, including the late K. Leelavathi Baipadithaya, Sumangala Ratnakar, and Priyanka Mohan herself.
• The art form was never considered a safe space for women artists. Growing up, Mohan had to combat similar sentiments from her own family, who discouraged her from taking up the dance form as a profession.
• Tvarita Arts Collective India aims to ensure that the wisdom from art forms such as Yakshagana, which has been passed down through generations, continues to live on. “If we don’t act now, we are at the risk of losing many of these art forms,” Mohan notes.

Social Impact

Code Effort recycling cigarette waste 

Cigarette stubs, the discarded ends of cigarettes, are a significant source of plastic pollution across the world. According to the WHO, approximately 4.5 trillion stubs are discarded every year globally. To address this growing problem, Naman Gupta, along with his brother Vipul Gupta, launched Code Effort in 2018.  

While various public health organisations are working to raise awareness about cigarette litter and the lack of proper disposal methods, Code Effort is taking a different approach as a B2B company, recycling this waste for commercial purposes. 

Saving the planet:

• The startup is currently working with firms like Reliance Retail, supplying textiles, paper, stationery, gift items, and more, all made from recycled cigarette stubs. Today, it recycles over five million cigarette stubs a day. 
• While the tobacco is turned into compost, the paper covering is used to make paper and mosquito repellents, and the cellulose acetate is converted into fibres for yarn and textiles at Code Effort’s in-house chemical treatment plant in Noida.
• Code Effort works with over 2,500 rag pickers, taking their help in collecting cigarette stubs. “Ragpickers are the traditional stakeholders in the waste management system. We provide them with additional income to help us collect cigarette stubs,” says Naman.

News & updates

• Gaming: French video game publisher Ubisoft plans to form a gaming subsidiary, with Chinese technology giant Tencent investing $1.25 billion into the unit. The subsidiary will include Ubisoft’s best-known games, including Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry, and Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six.
• Output: India’s infrastructure output grew 2.9% year-on-year in February, its slowest pace in five months as the decline in oil and natural gas production accelerated sharply. Infrastructure output, which tracks activity across eight sectors and makes up 40% of the country’s industrial production, grew at a revised rate of 5.1% in January.
• Earthquake: A powerful earthquake of 7.7 magnitude centred in Myanmar rocked Southeast Asia on Friday, killing several people and causing extensive damage, with rescuers in Bangkok searching for 81 people in the rubble of a collapsed building. Myanmar’s state-run MRTV said at least 144 people had been killed in the country and 732 injured.

What evolutionary trait have some African elephants developed as a direct result of intensive poaching?

Answer: In areas with heavy ivory poaching, some African elephants, particularly females, are evolving to be tuskless as a survival mechanism. 

We would love to hear from you! To let us know what you liked and disliked about our newsletter, please mail nslfeedback@yourstory.com. 

If you don’t already get this newsletter in your inbox, sign up here. For past editions of the YourStory Buzz, you can check our Daily Capsule page here.