Startup India, according to the document released by the Government, is a flagship initiative of the Government of India, intended to build a strong eco-system for nurturing innovation and Startups in the country that will drive sustainable economic growth and generate large scale employment opportunities.
Startup India is a current affairs topic and more GK questions in recent entrance exams including MBA entrance tests have been framed on it. Questions on GK or General Awareness form an important section with a weightage of 15 to 25% in almost all the national level MBA entrance tests including XAT, IIFT, SNAP. They are also the source of discussion during GD, PI, WAT, Extempore topics for MBA admission in IIMs, FMS, MDI, SPJIMR, XLRI and other highly ranked institutes.
MBAUniverse.com has begun with a unique initiative of publishing a series of current GK topics to benefit the MBA aspirants to know more about the current national and global environment that become the source of GK questions. The second in the series is Startup India while the first one was GST Bill.
The Government through the Startup initiative aims to empower Startups to grow through innovation and design. In order to meet the objectives of the initiative, Government of India has also announced a comprehensive Action Plan that addresses all aspects of the Startup ecosystem.
What is Startup India?
Key facts about Startup India can be summarised as below-
Startup India campaign is based on an action plan aimed at promoting bank financing for start-up ventures to boost entrepreneurship and encourage Startups with jobs creation.
-- The campaign was first announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his 15 August, 2015 address from the Red Fort.
-- The Prime Minister of India formally launched the initiative on January 16, 2016 from Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi
-- Government of India organized a global workshop on “Innovation and Start-ups on January 16, 2016
-- Startup India is focused on to restrict role of States in policy domain and to get rid of "Licence Raj" and hindrances like land permissions, foreign investment proposal, environmental clearances.
-- It is launched by Ministry of Commerce and Industry Government of India
-- A startup is an entity that is headquartered in India which was opened less than five years ago and has an annual turnover of less than ₹25 crore (US$3.7 million).
-- The government has already launched iMADE, an app development platform aimed at producing 1,000,000 apps and PMMY
-- MUDRA Bank, a new institution has been set up for development and refinancing activities relating to micro units with a refinance Fund of ₹200 billion (US$3.0 billion).
Startup India: Vision
-- Government of India has already launched the Action Plan for Startup India. With this Action Plan the Government hopes to accelerate spreading of the Startup movement.
-- The vision of Startup India is that the country must become a nation of job creators instead of being a nation of job seekers.
-- Startup India proposes to move further From digital/ technology sector to a wide array of sectors including agriculture, manufacturing, social sector, healthcare, education
-- It proposes to move from existing tier 1 cities to tier 2 and tier 3 citites including semi-urban and rural areas.
-- The Action Plan is divided across Simplification and Handholding; Funding Support and Incentives; Industry-Academia Partnership and Incubation among others
Steps taken to make ‘Startup India’ successful initiative
Startup India workshop organized on January 16, 2016 provided a platform to bring together all stakeholders, stimulate dialogue on key challenges that the Indian innovation ecosystem currently faces, and provide the potential solutions to address them. The process is ongoing and proposes to foster a fruitful culture of innovation in the country as an integral part of Startup India. This initiative will go a significant way in reiterating Government of India’s commitment to making India the hub of innovation, design and Start-ups.
To achieve this objective, following initiatives have been taken by the Government
Single Window Clearance even with the help of a mobile application
-- 10,000 crores of rupees assigned
-- 80% reduction in patent registration fee
-- Modified and more friendly Bankruptcy Code to ensure 90-day exit window
-- Freedom from mystifying inspections for 3 years
-- Freedom from Capital Gain Tax for 3 years
-- Freedom from tax in profits for 3 years
-- Elimination of red tape
-- Self-certification compliance
-- Innovation hub under Atal Innovation Mission
-- Starting with 5 lakh schools to target 10 lakh children for innovation programme
-- New schemes to provide IPR protection to start-ups and new firms
-- Encourage entrepreneurship.
-- Stand India across the world as a start-up hub
Ministries, institutes, RBI involved
The Ministry of Human Resource Development and the Department of Science and Technology have partnered in an initiative to set up over 75 such startup support hubs in the National Institutes of Technology (NITs); Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs); Indian Institutes of Science and Research (IISERs) and National Institutes of Pharmaceutical Education and Research (NIPERs).
The Reserve Bank of India is taking steps to help improve the ‘ease of doing business’ in the country and contribute to an ecosystem that is conducive for the growth of start-up businesses.
SoftBank, headquarterd in Japan, has invested US$2 billion in Indian startups. The Japanese firm had pledged the total investments at US$10 billion. Google has also declared to launch a startup, based on the highest votes in which the top three startups will be allowed to join the next Google Launchpad Week, and the final winner could win an amount of US$100,000 in Google cloud credits.
Oracle on 12 February 2016 announced to set up nine incubation centres at Bangalore, Chennai, Gurgaon Hyderabad, Mumbai, Noida, Pune, Trivandrum and Vijaywada.
Top performing ‘Startup’ States of India
Southern States of the nation have shown great performance, like Karnataka, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana which have results better than the rest of the country in terms of their policies implementations for supporting startups. Their focus has been on improving infrastructure, especially in the Tier-II cities.
Bengaluru, capital of Karnataka is performing very well in supporting Startups. Kerala is well known for the government’s startup policy, "Kerala IT Mission", which focus on fetching ₹50 billion(US$740 million) in investments for the State’s startup ecosystem. It also made India’s first telecom incubator Startup village in 2012. The state also matches the funding raised by its incubator from Central government with 1:1.
Telangana has launched the largest incubation center in India as "T-Hub". Andhra Pradesh has allocated a 17,000-sq.ft. Technological Research and Innovation Park as a Research and Development laboratory. It has also created a fund called "Initial Innovation Fund" of ₹100 crore (US$15 million) for entrepreneurs.
Madhya Pradesh has collaborated with the Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) to create a fund of ₹200 crore (US$30 million). Rajasthan has launched "Start-up Oasis" scheme.
Emerging GK questions from the Text
-- Is Startup India an entrepreneurship initiative?
-- Name the bank which is created for the prupose to refinance?
-- When was Action plan for Startup India launched?
-- Vision of Start-up India is to make the it a nation of job seekers/creators?
-- How many startup support hubs are to be created in the institutes?
-- What is the maximum turnover limit for Startup project?
-- Where should the headquarter of startup project be located?
-- Till how many years from its date of launch, the project will remain as Startup?
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