‘Made in India, made by Indians’: Divya Gokulnath invokes nationalism, says she and Byju Raveendran are under attack

Pushing back against what she describes as a “targeted campaign of intimidation,” Divya Gokulnath, co-founder of the beleaguered edtech firm BYJU’S, has claimed that her family is being deliberately pressured and isolated.

“They don’t know what we are made of, where we come from,” she said in an interview with ANI, asserting that she and her husband, Byju Raveendran, are being subjected to threats, reputational attacks, and coercive legal tactics in India and the United States.

“There is truth that binds all of us together,” Gokulnath said, referring to her husband’s inner circle. “Even our lawyers have been threatened. They’ve been told their license will be cancelled. People have been sent to our homes. This is the level to which they are trying to intimidate us.”

Gokulnath strongly denied allegations that the couple diverted loans from the company into personal accounts, claiming instead that they are struggling to even afford legal representation abroad. “If we truly had hundreds of millions of dollars, we would have had no trouble affording lawyers,” she said. “I'll show you emails where they say, ‘Give us a million dollars or we won’t represent you.’ Where do I get a million dollars from?” she added.

BYJU’S is currently embroiled in multiple legal disputes over unpaid debts, both in India and the United States. Gokulnath said their lack of representation in U.S. courts has resulted in a string of unfavourable judgments. “Today, in the US, judgments are passed back-to-back against us. Because we don’t have legal representation. We would’ve been fighting in the courts if we had the money.”

Pushing back against the narrative that the couple misused corporate funds, she said,

“Honestly, I don’t care about the money. It comes; it goes. And Lakshmi can come and go. Saraswati is with us.” She added, “What hurts is the tarnishing of our names, which I feel is so unfair.”

Calling the personal criticism “deeply unjust,” Gokulnath emphasised the couple’s nationalistic vision for BYJU’S. “It was all about what we could do for our country—not what the country can do for us. We are a Made in India, made by Indians, proudly made for the world company. We stayed back and built this in India when others were moving abroad for better opportunities.”

Despite the company’s dramatic fall from grace, Gokulnath maintains that their mission remains intact. “There is a final mission that binds us all together,” she said. “This won’t break us.”

Yet, for now, Gokulnath says the hardest part is watching the company they built being run by outsiders—people who, in her view, are not aligned with its original mission or committed to its founding values.

“It's probably the most difficult thing because your company is like your baby and to add to it the name is BYJU’S so that means it is the last name of all our three children so this is more than a company but ultimately it's not the company that we are married to it's the mission that we are married to,” said Gokulnath.