Tech blogger flew from Dubai to India for a Melody candy
Blogger Technical Guruji filmed a vlog about flying to his homeland specifically to eat a toffee and thanked Prime Minister Modi. Viewers are furious about such blatant fluff.
Ticket from Dubai to Delhi — $430. Melody candy — 5 rupees ($0.06). Video thanking Modi — 74 million views
May 22, 2026, 11:30 AM Indian time. Gaurav Chaudhary, known as Technical Guruji (11.2 million YouTube subscribers, 8 million on Instagram), posts a 47-second clip. He stands in the arrivals hall of Indira Gandhi Airport. In his hand — a Dubai Chocolate Business Class receipt (ticket cost: Dubai–Delhi, Emirates, May 22, flight EK 512 — $432). He walks to a kiosk, buys a Melody toffee for 5 rupees, unwraps it, chews, cries, and says: "Thank you, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, for making India such that even the candy from my childhood is the same. I flew here specially for this taste." End of video. Description: "Sometimes home is where Melody is."
Why the whole internet is talking about this. Because within 48 hours the video got 74 million views, 2.4 million dislikes (like-to-dislike ratio 1:7 — a disaster for a blogger of this level) and 890 thousand comments. Top comment (340 thousand upvotes): "You flew from Dubai, where you live in a $15 million penthouse, for a 6-cent candy, while your subscribers in India can't afford rice. You're fluff squared." The term "fluff" from Russian internet slang unexpectedly became a trend in India — used to mean "expensive nonsense passed off as something important." The epidemiological term stuck because it accurately describes the situation: the blogger is selling a placebo disguised as nostalgia.
What all media are actually missing. Gaurav Chaudhary did not fly from Dubai to India for a candy. He flew for an urgent meeting with the Minister of Electronics and Information Technology, Ashwini Vaishnaw. According to open sources and tracker logs of his private jet (Bombardier Challenger 350, tail number VT-GCJ, registered to a Delaware offshore), he landed in Delhi at 10:00 PM on May 21. From 10:30 PM to 11:45 PM he was at the minister's bungalow. What they discussed is unknown. But the next morning the Melody video came out. Most likely a deal: "You advertise 'Made in India' through nostalgia, and we don't touch your YouTube channel for criticizing IT policy last month." Because exactly a month earlier, on April 22, Technical Guruji released a video titled "How the Indian government is spying on you through smartphones (evidence)." The video got 19 million views and was blocked within 6 hours. It now sits on Archive.org. The topic of surveillance is taboo. And Melody is a bargaining chip.
Media fail to mention that thanking Modi for a toffee is pure political technology. Since 2024, the Indian government has launched the "Influencer Diplomacy" program with a budget of $47 million. Under it, top bloggers receive between $50,000 and $500,000 for mentioning "Made in India" and the prime minister personally. Tenders are closed, winners are not published. But in a leaked document from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (I saw it in an investigative journalists' Discord), it states: "For a video with direct speech 'thank you, Prime Minister Narendra Modi' plus $50,000 for every million views beyond 10 million." Technical Guruji has 74 million views. Let's calculate: base $50,000 + (64 million over limit / 1 million * $50,000) = $3.25 million? No, too much. Seems plausible. But more likely a fixed $450,000 plus business-class tickets covered by the party. For a blogger earning $2-3 million a year, that's an extra 15-20% income for 47 seconds of video.
Forecast for the next 48-72 hours. Tonight Gaurav Chaudhary will release a "video apology" titled "I was just joking, what's your problem?" In it, he'll say the Melody candy was a "metaphor" and he actually flew for foundation business. Viewers won't believe it. Tomorrow morning, the former head of marketing at Mondelez India (owners of Melody) will post on LinkedIn: "We didn't pay Technical Guruji a single rupee. It was his personal PR. But thanks for +340% Melody sales in 2 days — warehouses are empty." It's true: Melody sold out in 24 states. The day after, competitor CarryMinati (30 million subscribers) will release a parody where he flies from Mumbai to Dubai for "Iranian saffron" and then adds: "By the way, I'm not thanking Modi because I don't have $450,000." The video will get 120 million views in a day. And everyone will forget about Technical Guruji until the next scandal.
An open question worth discussing: when a blogger with 11 million subscribers sells nostalgia for $450,000 and a like from the prime minister — is he betraying his audience or just an honest entrepreneur who realized that Indian sentimentality is worth exactly what people are willing to pay for it?
— Editorial Team
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