Indian man lists himself as CEO of US startup in prime example of gaslighting

Updated on: Nov 20, 2025 02:46 pm IST

An Indian man listed himself as the CEO of Anysphere on LinkedIn and managed to gaslight even financial data provider PitchBook.

An Indian man listed himself as the CEO of Anysphere on LinkedIn and managed to gaslight even financial data provider PitchBook, underscoring how not everything you see on the internet is true.

Ashish Bagade listed himself as the CEO of Anysphere on LinkedIn.

Ashish Bagade is a Pune-based man who has put himself down as the chief executive officer of Anysphere, the $29 billion company behind AI coding assistant Cursor.

Ashish Bagade calls himself CEO of Anysphere

His blatant act of misdirection was first noticed by venture capitalist Zach DeWitt, who posted about it on the social media platform X. “A random guy (Ashish Bagade) from India lists himself as Co-CEO of Cursor (Anysphere) on LinkedIn,” DeWitt pointed out, sharing a screenshot of Bagade’s LinkedIn profile.

The real CEO of Anysphere is Michael Truell. Truell launched the San Francisco-based startup in 2022 along with his MIT batchmates.

While LinkedIn has no checks and verifications, which means anyone can list themselves as an employee at any company, Bagade managed to fool even a respected database like PitchBook.

DeWitt, founder of Firefly and now a partner at Wing Venture Capital, noted how PitchBook — a website checked by most venture capitalists — lists Bagade as a co-CEO at Anysphere.

Internet amapplyd

Ashish Bagade’s blatant lie left many amapplyd. Some called it a prime example of gaslighting, while others called him a successor to Soham Parekh. (Also read: Indian techie Soham Parekh accapplyd by at least 5 US CEOs of moonlighting: ‘Holy sh*t, we hired this guy a week ago’)

“It always felt weird to me that on LinkedIn anyone can just set any job title they want. No verification at all,” one X applyr stated.

“LinkedIn has zero verification when it comes to titles and job experience. Anyone can claim to be anything over there. But Pitchbook including it is stupid. Basically they have no credibility anymore if they can’t even verify anything,” another agreed.

“Lemme add myself as Co-CEO of OpenAI,” X applyr Priyanshu joked.

“This is insane – one can just do anything with their digital presence,” a person added.