Govt asks all states to set up Startup Hubs and incubators to help entrepreneurs

The Commerce and Industry Ministry under the leadership of Nirmala Sitharaman has asked all the states and the Union Territories to set up Startup Hub as well as incubators to help budding entrepreneurs.

The Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) has already set up the hub, which was operationalised since April. It helps in resolving queries and provides handholding support to startups. The hub has been able to resolve 12,290 queries received from startups through telephone, email and twitter, the DIPP said in a status report on Startup India.

DIPP has requested state governments and administration of UTs to set up Startup Hub as well as incubators to help startups during various stages of development, it said.

It also said that the department will write to top companies requesting them to support the initiative by setting up new incubators or scale up existing incubators in collaboration with educational institutes.

Further, it said that seven proposals for Research Parks, 16 proposals for TBIs (technology business incubators) and 13 proposals for startup centres have been recommended by the National Expert Advisory Committee formed by the HRD Ministry.

These proposals shall be implemented in the current financial year, it added.

All these steps are part of the Startup Action Plan announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in January.The government unveiled a slew of incentives to boost startup businesses, offering them a tax holiday and inspector raj-free regime for three years, capital gains tax exemption and Rs 10,000 crore corpus to fund them.

India has the third-largest number of startups globally.

Also read : Startups can now focus on their business, not compliances: Nirmala Sitharaman

Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has asked the finance ministry to consider raising tax holiday for startups to seven years to encourage budding entrepreneurs. The Ministry of Commerce and Industry has approached the Ministry of Finance with a proposal to expand the income tax exemption period from the current three years.

“I have been interacting with startups and a lot of them are in touch with us directly. The decision has to be taken by the Finance Ministry, who are favourably inclined to helping them out because this is a major initiative,” Minister of State for Commerce & Industry Nirmala Sitharaman told ET.