Privacy policy

For the Vargani app (formerly GaneshUtsav) (com.ragnar.GaneshUtsav on Android, com.ragnar.ganeshUtsav on iOS). Last updated 20 September 2026.

1. Who runs this app

Vargani, formerly GaneshUtsav, is an independent mobile app, published on Google Play as com.ragnar.GaneshUtsav and built for iOS as com.ragnar.ganeshUtsav. It is built and operated by an individual developer trading as Ragnar Servers, a sole proprietorship in Pune, India, and not by a company. That is the name on the WhatsApp Business account the app sends receipts from. It is not affiliated with any mandal, trust, government body or payment provider.

In this policy, "the app" means that mobile application on either platform, and "we" means that developer. You can reach us at contact@notragnar.com.

2. What the app stores

Everything the app stores is kept for us by Google Firebase, and everything listed below is either something you sign in with or something you or another member of your mandal typed into the app.

2.1 Your account

You can sign in with a Google account, with an email address and a password you choose, or, on an iPhone, with Apple. There is no OTP. When you sign in, the app stores your display name, your email address, the URL of your Google profile picture if you signed in with Google, a Firebase user id, the time of your last sign in, and the list of mandals you belong to.

Sign in with Apple is offered on iPhones only, and it asks Apple for your name and your email address. Apple sends both on your first sign in and never again, so what the app holds is what it stored that first time. If you chose to hide your address, what Apple sends is a relay address of theirs rather than your own, and the relay address is what the app has. That choice is made in Apple's own sheet, not in this app.

If you set a password, it is held by Firebase Authentication, which stores it hashed. The app never keeps a copy of it. A password reset is done by a link Firebase emails to the address on the account.

2.2 Your mandal

If you register a mandal, the app stores its name in Marathi and English, its city and area, the year it was founded, its registration type and registration number, a UPI id if you enter one, the logo image if you upload one, the join code, and the running receipt number.

A mandal keeps its accounts per utsav: one set of books for each thing it collects for, named by the mandal in its own words. For each utsav the app stores that name, when it was opened and by which member, its opening balance, its own running receipt number, and the words and picture the mandal chose for the head of its receipts (the "pavti design"). Every receipt, expense, promised vargani and gift carries which utsav it belongs to. A mandal that has opened no further utsav has one set of books and nothing more is stored about it.

An officer may also put the mandal on a map: a pin set by dragging the map, stored as two coordinates on the mandal, together with the officer's choice of whether to show it to everyone. A mandal that has not set a pin has none. With "show on the map" on, the mandal's name, its area and city, and the pin are listed in one shared document that every signed-in user of the app can read, on the नकाशावर मंडळं screen; with it off, the pin is the mandal's own. An officer can move the pin, turn the switch off, or remove the pin at any time.

The UPI id is stored only so it can be printed on the receipt. The app does not connect to UPI, does not initiate payments, and never sees a transaction.

2.3 The committee

For each karyakarta the app stores a name, a phone number if entered, the post they hold, the area assigned to them, their email address if they signed in with one, and their user id if they have joined the app. A karyakarta may choose to receive the mandal's notices; nothing else is stored for that. A karyakarta can upload an image of their own signature, which is then printed on receipts if they hold a signing post.

2.4 Donations, pending vargani and expenses

For each receipt the app stores what a receipt book would: the donor's name, the donor's phone number if entered, the amount, how it was paid, what it was for, any note, the serial number, who recorded it, and when. When several people gave as one, the other names are stored on that receipt; names only. For a pavti sent on WhatsApp the receipt also records whether it was delivered (section 2.9). A pending vargani stores the same details with the promised amount and date. Something given in kind is stored as an acknowledgement, with the giver's name and phone number if entered and what was given; it is never added to the accounts.

So that a mandal can answer "who gave last year", the app keeps a list of its donors by name, phone number and the date of their last receipt.

For each expense the app stores a title, an amount, a category, a date, who recorded it, and a photograph of the bill if one is attached. Bill photographs are taken from your camera or picked from your gallery.

2.5 Notifications

If you allow notifications, Firebase Cloud Messaging is used to tell the members of your mandal when a new receipt, expense, pending entry or announcement is added. Firebase issues a token to your device for this; the app does not keep it. A notification can include a donor name, an amount and a karyakarta name, because that is what members need to see, and it goes only to members of that one mandal.

2.6 On your device

The app saves your chosen language and keeps an offline copy of your mandal's data on the device so the app works without a network. This offline copy is removed when you uninstall the app.

2.7 What the app does not do

• It reads your device's location only while the two map screens are open: मंडळाचं ठिकाण, to put the pin where the phone is, and नकाशावर मंडळं, to show you as a dot among the mandals. Each asks for the permission when it opens and offers to turn location on if the phone has it off; you can decline, place the pin by hand and browse the map all the same. Nothing is stored or sent from that except the pin an officer then saves, and nothing is read in the background or on any other screen. (Google AdMob may separately estimate a general area from your IP address to select advertising; section 6.)
• It does not read your contacts, your call log or your messages.
• It does not process, hold or transfer any vargani, dengi or expense money. The one payment it takes is the optional Pro pass, and that is taken by Google Play or the App Store, not by the app (section 2.8).
• It does not ask for or store any bank account, card or UPI PIN detail.
• It does not use your microphone.
• It reads photographs only when you pick one for a bill, a logo or a signature, through your phone's own photo picker or the camera.

2.8 Vargani Pro and purchases

Vargani Pro is an optional season pass bought through Google Play or the App Store. The store takes the payment under its own terms and privacy policy; the app never sees a card number, a UPI id or a bank detail, and we never receive them.

Purchases are processed for us by RevenueCat, a subscription service. It receives from the app your user id, the mandal the pass is for, the store's purchase record (a transaction id, the product, the price, the time), and the device's platform, and it tells our server, which records on the mandal that it has Pro, from when until when, and which member bought it. Every member of that mandal can see that the mandal is Pro and until when; the buyer's name is shown with it.

"Restore purchases" asks the store for your purchase record again and sends it to RevenueCat; it is there because Apple requires it, and it sends nothing new. See the RevenueCat privacy policy.

2.9 Receipts sent on WhatsApp (Pro)

When a Pro mandal files a pavti with the donor's phone number, our server sends that pavti to the donor as a WhatsApp message from a WhatsApp Business number operated by us (in the name Ragnar Servers). The message is a fixed template approved by WhatsApp: the receipt as an image, the donor's name, the mandal's name, the amount and the receipt number, and a line saying it was sent through the Vargani app. Nothing else is ever sent to a donor this way: no notices, no reminders, no marketing.

To deliver it, the donor's phone number and that content are passed to Meta Platforms (the WhatsApp Business Platform), which processes them under its own terms and privacy policy, and which can see whether the number is on WhatsApp and whether the message was delivered. Meta reports that back to our server, and we store on the receipt only the outcome: sent, delivered, read, or failed with Meta's reason (for instance that the number is not on WhatsApp), when, and how many times. One receipt is sent at most three times, and a mandal may send up to 2,000 a season.

A receipt is sent only when the collector entered a number on it, and only for a Pro mandal; a receipt without a number is simply not sent. The mandal is responsible for having the donor's agreement to receive their receipt on WhatsApp before entering the number (section 3). A donor who does not want one can tell the mandal, or write to us, and we will clear the number from the receipt.

3. Data about other people

If a donor asks your mandal to remove their details, the adhyaksh, upadhyaksh or khajindar can correct the receipt inside the app, or you can write to us using the address in section 13 and we will remove the records for that mandal.

4. How the data is used

The data is used for these purposes and no others.

• To sign you in and to show you the mandals you belong to.
• To record vargani and produce a numbered receipt in PDF form.
• To add up the jama and kharch and produce the reports and CSV exports.
• To let members of your mandal see the same records that you see.
• To notify members of your mandal about new entries.
• To send a Pro mandal's pavti to its donor on WhatsApp, as described in section 2.9.
• To record and honour a Vargani Pro purchase, as described in section 2.8.
• To show advertising, as described in section 6, until the mandal is Pro.

Your data is not used to build an advertising profile of you by us, is not sold, and is not given to anyone for marketing.

5. Who it is shared with

Members of your mandal. Everyone who has joined your mandal with its join code can read that mandal's records, including donor names, amounts and expenses. This is deliberate, because a mandal's accounts are meant to be visible to the mandal. Only the adhyaksh, upadhyaksh and khajindar can add or correct a receipt, and only the adhyaksh, upadhyaksh, sachiv and khajindar can record an expense. Members of one mandal cannot see another mandal's records.

Google. The app runs on Google Firebase for sign in, database, file storage, notifications and server functions; Google processes that data as our service provider. The app also uses Google AdMob for advertising, and what AdMob collects (section 6) Google uses for its own advertising purposes under its own terms, which is why the stores' privacy labels show it as shared. The two map screens are drawn by the Google Maps SDK, which, while a map is open, receives the area being shown and the usual device and network details, under Google's own terms; it never receives your account. See the Firebase privacy notice and the Google privacy policy.

Meta (WhatsApp). For a Pro mandal's receipts only, the donor's phone number and the receipt are passed to the WhatsApp Business Platform to be delivered, as described in section 2.9. Meta processes them under its own terms.

RevenueCat, Google Play and the App Store. For a Pro purchase only: the store takes the payment, and RevenueCat processes the purchase record and tells our server, as described in section 2.8.

Anyone you send a receipt to. When you share or print a pavti, the PDF leaves the app and goes wherever you send it. What happens to it after that is outside our control.

We do not sell personal data. We do not share it with any company other than the service providers named above, and each of them only for the purpose named. We will disclose data only if we are required to by law.

6. Advertising

The app is free and shows advertisements supplied by Google AdMob. A mandal that has bought Vargani Pro sees none while the pass runs, and no advertising request is made from its members' phones in that time. AdMob may collect and use your device's advertising identifier, general information about your device, your IP address (from which it may estimate a general location), how you interact with the app and the ads you are shown, and crash and performance diagnostics of its own SDK, in order to select and measure advertising. This is done by Google, not by us, and we never receive your personal data from it.

Before any advertisement is requested, the app asks Google's consent platform whether a consent message is required for you, and shows it if it is. Where that message applies to you, your answer decides whether you are shown personalised or non personalised advertising. You can change that answer later from the privacy options entry the app shows when it is available to you.

You can also reset or delete the advertising identifier your phone hands out. On Android that is under Settings, Privacy, Ads. On iOS, Settings, Privacy and Security, Tracking decides whether an app may ask for it at all, and Settings, Privacy and Security, Apple Advertising covers Apple's own. How Google uses data from apps that use its services is described here.

7. Where it is stored

Records are stored in Google Cloud Firestore in the asia-south1 region, which is in Mumbai, India. The server functions that send notifications also run in that region. Images such as logos, signatures and bill photographs are stored in Firebase Storage, and sign in is handled by Firebase Authentication. Those two services, and Google AdMob, may process data on Google infrastructure outside India. RevenueCat processes purchase records in the United States. Meta processes WhatsApp messages on its own infrastructure, which may be outside India.

8. How long it is kept

Records are kept for as long as the mandal exists in the app, because an utsav's accounts have to remain available for the mandal and for anyone it answers to. Nothing is deleted automatically at the end of an utsav, and an utsav's books stay on the mandal's list, readable, after the next one is opened.

If you ask us to delete your account and data, we remove it as described in section 9. Uninstalling the app removes the offline copy from your phone but does not delete anything from Firebase, because your mandal's other members still need those records.

9. Your choices and rights

You can do the following at any time.

• Sign out. The app has a sign out option. Signing out does not delete anything.
• Turn off notifications in your phone's own settings for the app, under Notifications on either platform.
• Correct a receipt. The adhyaksh, upadhyaksh and khajindar can correct a donor's name, phone number, amount, mode and note from inside the app. The serial number cannot be changed, because it is what the donor was handed.
• Stop a receipt going to WhatsApp. File it without a number, or ask the mandal to clear the number from it; the app sends nothing to a receipt that has no number.
• A Pro refund is asked of the store you bought from, under its refund rules (Google Play: Order history; App Store: Report a Problem). If the store refunds it, the pass is withdrawn from the mandal.
• Ask for a copy of your data, or ask us to correct something, by writing to the address in section 13.
• Delete your account and data. You can do this from inside the app: open the account menu on the home screen and choose खाते कायमचे बंद करा. It removes your sign in, your profile, and your row in the committee list of every mandal you joined. In a mandal you registered yourself your row stays, because that seat is what the app reads to know a mandal still has someone answerable for it, and there is nobody left who could hand it back. The receipts you issued, the expenses you recorded and the history stay in the mandal’s books with your name on them, because a receipt is the mandal’s record and the donor is holding a copy of it. The full procedure, including deleting a whole mandal or only part of your data, is on the data deletion page.

10. Security

Traffic between the app and our providers is encrypted in transit. Access is controlled on the server side, not only in the app: a signed in user can read and write only the mandals they are a member of, and only the posts named in section 5 can add or correct records.

No system is completely secure, and we cannot promise that it is. In particular, anyone you give your mandal's join code to can join that mandal and read its records, so treat the join code as you would a key.

11. Children

The app is meant for adults who run a mandal's accounts. It is not directed at children, and we do not knowingly collect data from a child under 13. If you believe a child's data has been entered into the app, write to us and we will remove it.

12. Changes to this policy

If the app starts collecting something it does not collect today, this page will be updated and the date at the top will change. Please check it from time to time. Continuing to use the app after a change means you accept the updated policy.

13. Contact

Write to contact@notragnar.com for anything in this policy, including access, correction and deletion requests. We reply within 7 working days.