With Economy In Slowdown, Modi Pins Growth Hopes On Startups

Showing confidence in the ability of startups to bring innovation and drive business in the Indian economy, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that the Indian startup ecosystem will help India achieve the $5 Tn target for the economy set by the government.

Speaking at the IIT Madras convocation on September 30, Modi said “Your innovation, aspiration and application of technology will fuel this dream [of $5 Tn economy]. It has become the bedrock of India’s big leap into the most competitive economy.”

Modi, in the event, also highlighted that India is one of the top-three startup ecosystems in the world and lauded Tier 2 and Tier 3 startups for powering the startup ecosystem. The PM also claimed that the world is looking at new India as a land of unique opportunities.

PM highlighted that India’s startup ecosystem is a common point of discussion between the heads of state, business leaders and stakeholders — investors and entrepreneurs.

Modi had also spoken about the Indian startup ecosystem in the Singapore-Indian Hackathon, earlier that day.

Speaking about the intentions behind the government’s efforts to encourage innovation, Modi point out towards two reasons. The first was to come up with effective solutions to solve India’s problems and make life easier. And the government also wanted to encourage India to find solutions for the whole world — or Indian solutions for global applications, as Modi put it.

The PM added that India’s cost-effective solutions should be available to serve the needs of the poorest countries and the most deprived, no matter where they live as “technology unites people even across countries, across continents”.

The $5 Tn Economy Roadmap

Earlier this year, Modi had expressed a desire to take India to a $5 Tn economy by 2024. Later, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, while presenting her maiden budget, presented a roadmap to the target, which included strategic disinvestment, cutting down the corporate tax, making investments more lucrative for foreign entities, and a push to the Indian startup ecosystem through various policies.

India’s GDP is currently at $2.7 Tn, however, in Q1 2019, India registered a six-year low in the quarterly GDP, registering a decline of 0.8% from 5.8% in the last quarter. The decline was also at the time, when India was going through an economic slowdown, which has particularly hit the automobile, manufacturing and real estate sector.

However, despite the fall, India has managed to regain its fifth largest economy spot in 2019. The country had slipped to seventh position in 2018

Note: We at Inc42 take our ethics very seriously. More information about it can be found here.