Google opens up paid Apps for Indian developers

Google has added India to the list of countries from where developers could publish paid Apps to Google Play, the apps market for the Android mobile operating system according to a report in The Hindu newspaper.

Till now, developers in India were permitted to put out only free Applications, which severely affected the business models of developers, as it offered nothing by way of incentive to put out innovative Apps.

With the latest development, Google hopes to bring in a large cross section of developers in the country on to the Android ecosystem.

The report quoted Ashish Sinha, founder of Pluggd.in one of the more prominent websites focused on local start-ups as saying that the move was overdue for some time now.

It would pave the way for creating business models around innovative Apps. He added Android was big in the Indian smart devices space, and this would help fuel development of the localised Apps too, he added.

Until now developers were trying to figure out ways to get around the restriction which in some cases meant travelling to the US to create a local bank account there in the names of relatives and friends or even floating a company there for the purpose.