Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday commends entrepreneurs in Assam for furthering a spirit of enterprise and innovation in the Northeast and expressed his happiness to see Northeast as centre of start-ups.
“Happy to see the Northeast emerges as a vibrant centre for start-ups. Heard the experiences of innovators based in Assam,” Modi said.
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He was interacting with young innovators and start-up entrepreneurs from across the country, through video bridge. This is the fourth interaction by the Prime Minister through video bridge series with various beneficiaries of Government schemes.
“It is very important to foster innovative thinking from a very young age. A great step by Prime Minister Narendra Modi ji to interact with young entrepreneurs & motivate them to dream big as start-ups will drive the new growth engine of our country,” Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal tweeted.
Prime Minister said things have changed from the time where start-ups meant only digital and technology innovation. He said there are start-up entrepreneurs in many fields now. Start-ups are filed in 28 states, 6 union territories and 419 districts. Of these, 44 percent of start-ups registered are from tier-2 and tier-3 cities as start-up India is focussing on encouraging local innovations from their areas. In addition, 45 percent of the start-ups are set up by women.
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Modi also explained how filing patents and trademarks have become easy under the government. Government has brought down the number of forms needed to apply for trademark from seventy-four to eight, resulting in three-fold increase in Trade Marks registration in three years. Number of patents registered has also seen a three-fold increase compared to the previous government.
The Prime Minister said the government has created Rs 10,000 crore ‘Fund of Funds’ to ensure that young entrepreneurs may not face shortage of funds for their start-ups and to facilitate youngsters to innovate. Through the ‘Fund of Funds’, Rs 1,285 crore funding has been committed, leveraging a total of Rs 6,980 crore in venture funds so far.
Interacting with the participants, Modi said in order to foster innovation and competition amongst youngsters, government has started various competitions like Atal New India Challenge, Smart India Hackathon and Agriculture Grand Challenge. Prime Minister also mentioned his discussion with Prime Minister of Singapore, on holding a Smart India Hackathon like challenge between innovators from Singapore and India.
Prime Minister also reiterated the governments’ commitment in encouraging innovation in India. Eight Research Parks and 2,500 Atal Tinkering Labs are being established all over the country to encourage youngsters to take up research and innovation.
Addressing the innovators, Modi invited youngsters to ideate on how to transform agricultural sector. He said ‘Design in India’ is essential along with ‘Make in India’. Prime Minister also encouraged youngsters to continue innovating and gave the mantra of ‘Innovate or Stagnate’.
The Prime Minister also gave a clarion call to nation to make ‘Innovate India’, a mass movement. He encouraged the citizens to share their ideas and innovations through #InnovateIndia.