Lol true. It's just running on brand name these days after Steve Jobs death.
Apple is basically clever marketing, for those who like to show off stuff a lot. Like they have specific unique marketing terms for each of their products, like airpods instead of Bluetooth earphones, earpods instead earphones, lightning cable instead of usb, face id instead of face recognition or iris scanning, face time for audio video calls, airdrop and a lot more, etc etc.
So whenever a person is using Apple products, it's automatically showing off and marketing Apple products, which is why most people buy it (no joke).
Price hike is because it launches here officially atleast a month or two later here. So it has to be self imported. Since demand is super high of latest iPhones, so they sell in black. Lack of official presence and high demand and limited supply is what causes it. Even Redmi Note 4x used to sell for around 25k locally before official presence.