Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday announced that January 16 will be celebrated as
'Startup' day and said that while small businesses are the spine of India's economy, Start-Ups are
the game changers.
"Small businesses are the spine of India's economy and Startups are the game changers. This
partnership can benefit both, the society and the economy, especially women employment will get
strengthened because of this," Modi said as he interacted with Start-Ups via video conferencing as
part of the Start-Up India Innovation Week.
Recalling the concept of the current decade as the 'techade' of India, the Prime Minister listed three
important aspects of the massive changes that the government is making in this decade to
strengthen the innovation, entrepreneurship, and startup ecosystem.
Elaborating on those steps, Modi said, first, to liberate entrepreneurship and innovation from the
web of government processes, bureaucratic silos; second, creating an institutional mechanism to
promote innovation and third, handholding of young innovators and young enterprises. He listed
programmes such as 'Startup India' and 'Stand-Up India' as part of the efforts.
Modi also spoke about bringing in ease by way of addressing issues related to 'angel tax',
simplification of tax procedure, arranging for government funding and allowing self-certification
of nine labour and three environment laws.
The Prime Minister also said that the Government's effort was to institutionalise innovation in the
country by creating attraction for innovation among students since childhood.
"More than 9,000 Atal Tinkering Labs are giving children a chance to innovate in schools and
work on new ideas," he said, adding, "whether it is new drone rules, or new space policy, the
priority of the government is to provide opportunities for innovation to as many youths as
possible."
Underscoring the role of empowerment by entrepreneurship in addressing the problems of
development and regional-gender disparities, Modi said, there is at least one Start-Up in each of
the 625 districts of the country and more than half of the Start Ups are from tier II and III cities.
"These are changing ideas of youth from ordinary, poor families into successful businesses."