States’ Startup Ranking | Gist of Rajya Sabha TV / RSTV (now Sansad TV) - UPSC PDF Download

Introduction

• The states with the finest track records for creating startup ecosystems for aspiring entrepreneurs are Gujarat, Karnataka, and Meghalaya. Other top achievers are Kerala, Maharashtra, Odisha, and Telangana. According to the findings of the third edition of the Ranking of States' on Support to Start-up Ecosystems, this is the case. 
• The exercise was organised by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) with the primary goal of promoting India's vision of cooperative and competitive federalism. 
• The experiment included 24 states and 7 Union territories (UTs), who were ranked in the best performers, top performers, leaders, aspiring leaders, and developing startup ecosystems categories.

States’ Startup Ranking

• It is an annual report presented by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), ranking the country’s states and UTs according to their startup ecosystems.
• The exercise has grown in its impact over the last three editions, with 31 participating states and union territories this edition, the highest to date.
• The State Start-up Ranking Exercise aims to support states and union territories in developing their start-up ecosystem and learn from the best practices in each state and union territory.
• States and Union Territories are classified into 5 Categories, viz. Best Performers, Top Performers, Leaders, Aspiring Leaders and Emerging Start-up Ecosystems.
• Gujarat and Karnataka emerged as the Best Performersin a category of States which included NCT of Delhi.
• Meghalaya won the top honour among UTs and North-eastern (NE) States. While Kerala, Maharashtra, Orissa and Telangana got the Top Performersaward among states, Jammu & Kashmir emerged as the Top Performer among UTs and NE states.
• Assam, Punjab, Tamil Nādu, Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh were adjudged the winners in the Leaderscategory among states.
• Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Arunachal Pradesh and Goa bagged the Leaders honour among the UTs and NE states.

States were evaluated on

The participants were evaluated across 7 broad Reform Areas consisting of 26 Action Points ranging from

• Institutional Support
• Fostering Innovation and Entrepreneurship
• Access to Market
• Incubation support
• Funding Support
• Mentorship Support to Capacity Building of Enablers.

Start-ups can act as an agent of change

Healthcare

• Finding genuine doctors is still unbelievably tough in India
• Patient records are either maintained in fat files or if they are online, they are often not accessible or understandable.

Easy access to quality education

• Today, despite increase in incomes, access to quality learning is still limited to what is available to students around.
• Ed-tech startups can thus champion the cause of access, quality, and performance.

Sanitation

• Around 2.6 billion people or 41 percent of the world’s population until now does not have access to basic sanitation.
• It is imperative to invest in solutions by offering different sanitation products and services at appropriate prices.

Waste management

• Fresh and innovative ideas in consonance with the ambitious Swachh Bharat Abhiyan are required to solve this problem, which otherwise can have drastic repercussions in the near future.

Pollution

• New technologies have the potential to revolutionise the way air pollution research and policy are conducted, with a more efficient people-focussed approach.

Public Transport

• There is a massive need for public transport options because not everyone can afford these cab services, and private enterprises can fill the breach left by state-sponsored infrastructure.

Agriculture

• There are glaring gaps in the supply chain management and also poor last-mile connectivity especially at grass-roots level as well lack of investments to drive the businesses.

Safety of women

• Technology and access to it can solve many issues that women face in their day to day lives.

Startups in augmenting the economic image of India

• The Indian start-up ecosystem is nothing short of a revolution with $106-billion worth of value-creation by 44 unicorns, in turn creating 4 million direct and indirect jobs.
• Today, India is the third largest start-up ecosystem globally, by number of start-ups, with more than 15,000 start-ups established in 2020, up from 5000 in 2010.
• The contribution of startups include by way of large infusion of FDI in an asset class outside of public markets, export of products and services by the country.
• India currently stands third in the global list of the number of companies that have attained unicorn status well behind the US and China, but ahead of the UK and Germany.
• Moreover, women entrepreneurs have also contributed immensely to the start-up ecosystem
• Ancillary industries rise up creating more avenues of innovation, growth and employment.
• The unicorns like ola, flipkart which are consumer centric have created an alternate gig economy for workers, which gives them much needed flexibility.
• Due to competition among unicorns, consumers are benefited through competitive pricing.
• It has created an ecosystem in cities such as Bengaluru and Delhi, which has paved way for more capital and investments flowing into the nation.

Conclusion

• Indian Startups are now spread across the length and breath of the entire country.
• The shift in global focus is on promoting women entrepreneurs and fostering an inclusive and innovative environment.
• The role of the state government becomes very important in developing the necessary infrastructure and support to foster the startup ecosystem. Due to the given constraints of infrastructure and supporting services, India needs to build upon low-cost and high-impact solutions.