The controversy surrounding Indian techie Soham Parekh took a new turn this week after the founder of a US-based AI startup accused him of exploiting geopolitical tensions between India and Pakistan for emotional manipulation. Arkadiy Telegin, the founder of Leaping AI, alleged that Parekh used the backdrop of Operation Sindoor to guilt-trip him over delays in workflow, despite being safe in Mumbai.
Taking to X (formerly Twitter), Telegin posted screenshots of a private conversation with Parekh during the height of the military operation. In the messages, timestamped at 2:29 AM, Parekh wrote: “Drone shot down 10 minutes away.” A visibly concerned Telegin responded by asking if he was safe, to which Parekh replied that “a building near [his] home had been damaged.”
Telegin wrote in the accompanying post, “Soham used to guilt-trip me for being slow on PRs when the India-Pakistan thing was going on, all while he was in Mumbai. The next person should hire him for the Chief Intelligence Officer role.”
The post drew significant attention online, with mixed reactions. Some users accused Telegin of seeking to underpay workers, implying that Parekh was simply part of a broader gig economy. One user responded critically, suggesting he was hunting for “cheap labour.” In reply, Telegin defended his compensation offer, stating, “I offered him between $150,000 and $200,000, plus equity. I don’t think that’s cheap labour.”
The revelation adds to a growing pile of allegations against Parekh, who is at the centre of a widespread moonlighting scandal that has rocked multiple American startups. The controversy erupted after Mixpanel co-founder Suhail Doshi publicly accused Parekh of simultaneously working at three to four startups under false pretences.
Following Doshi’s viral post, several founders came forward corroborating the claims. Flo Crivello, founder and CEO of Lindy, posted: “Holy sh*t. We hired this guy a week ago. Fired this morning. He did so incredibly well in interviews, must have a lot of training. Careful out there.”*
Matthew Parkhurst, CEO of Antimetal, also confirmed that Parekh had worked for them before being dismissed for moonlighting. “Funnily enough, Soham was our first engineering hire in 2022. Really smart and likeable; enjoyed working with him. We realised pretty quickly that he was working at multiple companies and let him go,” Parkhurst shared on X.
Nicolai Ouporov, co-founder of Fleet AI, and Adish Jain, founder of Mosaic, also alleged that Parekh had been employed at their firms while simultaneously working elsewhere. All echoed a similar pattern—Parekh consistently performed well during interviews but failed to maintain regular workflows, later revealed to be juggling multiple roles at once.
Despite the mounting criticism, Parekh recently admitted in an interview with TBPN that he had indeed worked for several companies at the same time, citing financial hardship as his primary motivation. “It is true,” he told the interviewer. “I’m not proud of what I’ve done. It’s not something I endorse either… No one really likes to work 140 hours a week, but I had to do it out of necessity.”
Parekh has since announced that he is joining Darwin Studios, an AI-driven media platform, and promised to focus solely on this one role moving forward. “This is the only thing I am going to focus on. They’ve put a bet on me, and I have a lot to prove,” he said during the interview.
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