I have to wonder if perhaps they perceive that with the wide income disparity in India, there's not a sufficiently large market for $200-$500 devices.

Let's say they can sell 15,000 at $500 each. Maybe they think that many of those buyers hardly care about the price, so why not sell 10,000 at $1000 each? Then they get $10M instead of $7.5M.

I can certainly identify with the frustration of people who do care about price, and could bear the price tag offered in other countries.