Freedom 251

The Indian Cellular Association (ICA) has doubted that a smartphone can realistically be sold at a price as low as Rs 251 and have asked the Telecom Minister, Ravi Shankar Prasad, to intervene. According to the ICA, even with a subsidized sale, the selling price should not be less than Rs 3,500 (US$52.28 as of 31 August 2016). The ICA also complained that senior members of the government had been present at the product launch.^[11]

The prototype showcased and handed out to media at the time of launch were rebadged Adcom devices, for which Adcom threatened to sue Ringing Bells. But units circulated later were totally different from the original prototype.^[12]

According to Narayanan Madhavan writing in the Hindustan Times, a price of Rs 251 is possible only through deals with advertising partners. Such deals would only be possible once a very large number of handsets were in use.^[13]

On 20 February 2016, the offices of Ringing Bells were raided by government officials investigating why the product does not have a Bureau of Indian Standards certification.^[14]

Some commentators indicate that the Freedom 251 sale is a scam.^[15] The phone looks like a Chinese phone where the original brand label was covered with whitener. The icons shown on screen shots are copied from Apple's iPhone. There are also reports that many people ordered the phone but did not even receive a confirmation email. Bharatiya Janata Party MP Kirit Somaiya described Ringing Bells as "a Ponzi bogus company scam". He has requested that the Telecom Ministry, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, and various other ministries investigate the company.^[16] As a result of these concerns, the payment gateway facilitator PayUBiz decided to withhold payment to Ringing Bells until the items were dispatched.^[8]

The Telecom Ministry after conducting an internal assessment on the phone found that it could not be offered for less than Rs. 2,300 - 2,400 ($34.36-$35.85 USD as of 31 August 2016).^[17]

Ringing Bells has also been accused of fraud and non-payment of dues by its customer services provider Cyfuture. ^{[18] [19] [20]} Subsequent investigation revealed that the company not only duped its customers but also its suppliers and employees. Freedom 251 scam amount is believed to be around ₹20 crore (US$2.98 million) ^[21]

Goel was later arrested by Indian authorities over the aforementioned fraud allegations, after the owner of Ghaziabad-based Ayam Enterprises filed an FIR alleging that Ringing Bells “defrauded” it of ₹16 lakh (US$23,811.19).^[22][23][24]

The domain expired and was auctioned by Godaddy. On 24 March 2019, the new owner converted it into a Tech blog.^[25]

Ringing Bells says it had delivered 5,000 units of Freedom 251 by 9 July 2016, and claimed to be delivering another 65,000 units to customers.^[26][27]