Ashish Hemrajani:The Entrepreneur Who Made Booking a Ticket a Digital Habit

# Ashish Hemrajani: The Entrepreneur Who Made Booking a Ticket a Digital HabitBefore online ticketing became an everyday part of Indian life, booking a seat for a cricket match, concert or movie could involve queues, phone calls and a surprising amount of uncertainty.Ashish Hemrajani saw an opportunity in that inconvenience.In 1999, while on a trip to South Africa, Hemrajani reportedly came across the idea of using the internet to sell tickets after noticing how efficiently technology could connect audiences with events. The observation eventually became the foundation for what would become BookMyShow.The journey, however, was far from an overnight success.Hemrajani returned to India and began building the business at a time when internet adoption was still limited and consumers were not accustomed to making transactions online.The company initially operated under the name BigTree Entertainment and focused on helping businesses manage and sell advertising and event-related inventory. Over time, its focus shifted increasingly toward ticketing.That shift proved transformative.As India’s internet penetration grew and smartphones became commonplace, the way people discovered entertainment began changing rapidly.BookMyShow positioned itself at the centre of that transition.Instead of consumers having to search individually for cinema schedules, concerts or live events, the platform brought information and ticket purchasing into one place.But the real challenge was not creating a website.It was changing consumer behaviour.People had to become comfortable paying digitally for something they would experience later. Cinema chains and event organisers also needed confidence that online ticketing could become a meaningful part of their businesses.Hemrajani’s company gradually built that bridge.Over the years, BookMyShow expanded beyond movies into concerts, theatre, sports and other live experiences, becoming one of India’s most recognisable entertainment-ticketing platforms.Its evolution reflected a broader change in the country itself.India was moving from a world of physical queues and paper tickets toward an economy where discovery, payment and access could happen through a smartphone.Hemrajani’s contribution was not simply building another technology platform.He helped make digital ticketing feel ordinary.That may sound simple today, but transforming a behaviour that millions of people had followed for decades requires persistence, timing and an understanding of how technology fits into everyday life.His journey also highlights an important aspect of entrepreneurship: some of the most influential businesses do not invent entirely new needs.They make existing experiences significantly easier.People already wanted to watch films, attend concerts and follow sporting events.The opportunity was to remove the friction between wanting to attend and actually getting a ticket.BookMyShow became the bridge.Ashish Hemrajani’s story is therefore less about creating a flashy startup and more about recognising a small inconvenience before it became a massive opportunity.He saw a future in which a ticket could be booked in seconds rather than obtained through a queue.Today, that behaviour feels almost automatic.And sometimes, that is the clearest sign that an entrepreneur has changed an industry: when the solution becomes so familiar that people forget there was ever another way.