We read AJIO's own jewellery set, anklet and ethnic jewellery results on 1 October 2026 - 116 listings. On twenty of them the stated MRP is the selling price multiplied by exactly ten, and all twenty show a 90% badge: Rs. 419 against Rs. 4,193, Rs. 215 against Rs. 2,153, Rs. 209 against Rs. 2,089. Five Lucky Jewellery listings run the same shape at exactly 5.00x. And not one of the 116 publishes a star rating or a review count, so the badge is the only comparative number the shelf offers. The flattest figures on the page belong to AJIO's own YOUSTA label: Rs. 119 against Rs. 149, a 20% badge.

Dot & Key's refund page runs on a 48-hour clock. "You need to inform us within 48 hours of receipt of the products" - the tightest reporting window among six Indian D2C beauty brands whose policies we read the same morning, where seven days is the norm. Returns are accepted only for transit damage, physical defects or a wrong product shipped, with photographs, and are refused if the seal is broken. Refunds then split by payment method: 7 working days if you paid online, 14 working days if you paid cash on delivery. Free delivery starts at Rs. 999, against Rs. 399 at Beardo and mCaffeine. Every term is quoted from the brand's own pages, read 1 October 2026.

Mamaearth's refund page runs two clocks and most buyers only remember one. Seven days from delivery to report a wrong or expired product - but only two days to report a damaged or missing one, which is exactly the case a courier creates. Neither is a change-of-mind return; opened, used or unpackaged products are refused outright. Cancellation is possible only "till the status is 'Ready to Ship'", and that route refunds in 7 business days, while a return takes 2 working days to review, 5-7 business days for pickup and - the page's own words - "2 weeks after the return has been picked up". Self-shipped courier costs come back as PayTM or Mamapay wallet credit, not cash.

mCaffeine's policy page puts a clock on something most brands leave vague. "You can do so by sending us an email at woot@mcaffeine.com within 3 hours of placing the order" - and "Once orders have been dispatched, they cannot be canceled." After that the page offers the doorstep rather than a returns desk: "You can simply refuse to accept the parcel at the time of delivery as the order will not be returned once delivered." Fault cases get five days from delivery by email or phone; a parcel marked delivered but never received gets only 72 hours. Shipping is free above Rs. 399, with cash on delivery at no extra charge. Every term is quoted from the brand's own page, read 1 October 2026.

Minimalist's refund page turns on one word. "We offer refunds / replacements only in following cases" - a wrong shipment, a damaged product, an expired product. All three are about what arrived, not what you thought of it, and the window is seven days, after which "No return or any other claim will be acceptable or valid". The process is 48 hours to review, a courier pickup from your door with no self-ship clause, and then - once the issue is verified - a refund initiated within 24 hours, the fastest final step among six Indian D2C beauty brands whose policies we read the same morning. Every term is quoted from the brand's own page, read 1 October 2026.

We read six Indian D2C brands' own return policies on 1 October 2026 - Beardo, Dot & Key, Mamaearth, mCaffeine, Minimalist and Libas. The window to report a problem runs from 48 hours (Dot & Key) to seven days, with mCaffeine at five - and Mamaearth gives only two days for a damaged or missing item against seven for a wrong or expired one. Five of the six refuse change-of-mind returns outright; Libas, the clothing brand, is the exception, though its page states 15 days in the headline and 7 in the clause. The shortest clock of all is mCaffeine's: three hours to cancel an order, by email. Refunds run from 24 hours after verification to about two weeks after pickup.

We read both clothes-iron shelves on the same afternoon, 30 September 2026 - 15 irons on Amazon and 17 on Vijay Sales, after removing the twelve garment steamers the two shelves mix in. Amazon's median is Rs. 1,335 and Vijay Sales' is Rs. 1,899, but priced per watt they are Rs. 1.19 against Rs. 1.22 - the gap is stock mix, not price, and the cheapest iron across both shelves is a Rs. 619 Bajaj on Vijay Sales. Two Philips model numbers are sold in both places, and Amazon is Rs. 87 and Rs. 180 cheaper on them. Two Amazon listings state an MRP exactly 100 times their price, producing the only 99% badges here; both are excluded from every figure. Vijay Sales published no rating on any of its 17 irons.

We read the whole Vijay Sales fan category on 30 September 2026 and counted it twice. It returns 27 listings and sells 16 fans. Seven groups of tiles share an identical price, an identical stated MRP and the same model name - the Atomberg Renesa 1200mm appears five times, every tile at Rs. 3,899 and 31% off. Ten of the sixteen distinct fans are Atomberg, and there is no Havells, Crompton, Orient, Usha or Bajaj ceiling fan on the shelf at all. One model, the Studio Nexus, is listed twice at two different prices against one stated MRP: Rs. 4,498 and Rs. 4,599. And 15 of the 16 ceiling fans state the same 1200mm sweep, so this shelf effectively sells one size.

We read both men's sweatshirt shelves on the same morning, 30 September 2026 - 30 men's listings on AJIO and 32 on Myntra, after stripping the four boys' hoodies and eight women's styles AJIO's search mixes in. AJIO's median price is Rs. 588 and Myntra's is Rs. 861, and AJIO has twelve listings under Rs. 500 where Myntra has one. AJIO's bigger badge is not the reason: its median stated MRP is Rs. 2,462 against Myntra's Rs. 2,249, so the percentage is larger because the MRP is. The difference that should decide it: AJIO published no rating at all on any of its 30 listings, while Myntra published one on 23 of 32 at a median of 377 ratings. And on MISCHIEF MONKEY, the only brand selling on both, Myntra is the cheaper site.

We read Vijay Sales' water heater shelf on 30 September 2026 - 22 listings - and divided each price by the tank capacity its own title states. A 25-litre storage geyser works out at Rs. 396 a litre. A 3-litre instant heater runs to Rs. 1,500 a litre - 3.8 times as much. The sharpest number on the shelf: the single 10-litre heater costs Rs. 10,100 while a 25-litre tank costs Rs. 9,899, so the smaller tank costs more actual money than one holding two and a half times the water. The discount badge is no guide to any of this - the cheapest litre and the dearest litre on the shelf both advertise 30% off, and the largest badge in the read, 59%, sits mid-table. Vijay Sales published no rating on any of the 22 listings.

We read AJIO's bath towel, hand towel, bath mat, door mat and bathrobe shelves on 30 September 2026 - 152 distinct listings - and grouped them by aisle. The five median discount badges read 29.5% on hand towels, 36.5% on bath towels, 44% on bath mats, 59% on door mats and 75% on bathrobes. Not one of the 28 bathrobes sells at less than 67% off. The reason is in the MRP column: the robe shelf states a median MRP of exactly 4.00 times its selling price, where bath towels state 1.58 times. AJIO published no star average and no rating count on any of the 152 listings, so the badge is the only differentiating number a buyer gets - and one seller holding 25 of the 39 door mats prices them anywhere from Rs. 120 to Rs. 369 a mat behind badges that move the other way.

We read both study-table shelves on the same afternoon, 30 September 2026 - 48 listings on Amazon and 41 on Tata CLiQ. Amazon's median is Rs. 2,399 and Tata CLiQ's is Rs. 5,799, but that gap is stock mix rather than price: Amazon's four cheapest listings are folding bed tables and it has 19 listings under Rs. 2,000 to Tata CLiQ's one. Eleven pairs on Tata CLiQ's shelf share an identical price and MRP because they are one desk in two finishes, and 24 of its 41 listings are a single brand - so 41 results is nearer 30 products. And the evidence gap is the widest we have recorded: Amazon's largest rating count here is 8,632, while every rating count on Tata CLiQ's shelf fits in the list 1 to 5.

We read Amazon's whole 'dustbin' shelf on 30 September 2026 - 47 listings, 14 of them boxes of garbage bags - and divided the 33 real bins by the capacity they print. The cheapest litre on the shelf is Rs. 25.90, on a 25-litre plastic bin at Rs. 647. The dearest under Rs. 1,000 is Rs. 139.80, on a 5-litre steel bin at Rs. 699. That is a factor of 5.4 for the same job, and the discount badges point the wrong way: the bin advertising 28% off costs Rs. 25.90 a litre and the bin advertising 70% off costs Rs. 119. The most-rated listing in the entire read, with 10,715 ratings, is a Rs. 170 bin that goes in a car cup holder. Twenty-four bins seated, every price read the same afternoon.

We read Myntra's shoe-rack shelf on 30 September 2026 - 46 tiles, 40 of them shoe racks - and every single one prints its own tier count, so the unit price is computable for all of them. The prices barely move: Rs. 480 to Rs. 1,082, a 2.3x spread. The rate per tier moves four times as much: Rs. 88.30 to Rs. 360.70. The dearest rack on the shelf holds three tiers; the cheapest rate belongs to a nine-tier rack at Rs. 795. And 19 of the 40 listings are just eight racks sold in several colours - four tiles are the same Rs. 619 Fabura, publishing 22 ratings, 7, none and none. Which feedback you see depends on which colour you click. Twenty-four racks seated, every price read the same day.

We read both men's wallet shelves on the same morning, 30 September 2026 - 32 listings on Myntra and 40 on AJIO. A listing named 'Puma Leather Stripe Bi-Fold Wallet' costs Rs. 1,374 on both sites, against the same Rs. 2,499 stated MRP and the same 45% badge. A second Puma model is Rs. 1,379 on Myntra and Rs. 1,264 on AJIO. Across the shelves as a whole Myntra is cheaper - a Rs. 519 median against Rs. 698 - but that is assortment, not pricing: AJIO stocks up to Rs. 4,500 where Myntra stops at Rs. 1,379. AJIO published no rating on any of its 40 listings; Myntra published one on 26 of 32, at a median of 1,595 ratings. On sweatshirts the same morning, the price result ran the other way.