Entrepreneurship awareness on a rise in the north

It is believed that better awareness and success stories of other entrepreneurs are encouraging people to foray into the sector

Awareness about entrepreneurship among individuals and shrinking employment opportunities amid economic slowdown has been driving the student community in north to opt for their own ventures.

Most business schools in the region are now having entrepreneurship cells to encourage students take up self run businesses as a career option.

Ajay P Srivastava, joint director, Software Technology Parks of India, Mohali, says that last year, 30-35 new start up in the Information Technology (IT) space have come up in the region. The number of new start up in IT in the Mohali region have, in last few years, been hovering around 30.

Srivastava believes better awareness and success stories of other entrepreneurs are encouraging people to foray into the sector.

Nikhil Dwivedi who heads the entrepreneurship cell in the Rayat Bahra Group of Colleges says, last year, they organised 16 awareness camps for entrepreneurship awareness across the state. This year also they plan to organise similar number of awareness camps.

According to Dwivedi, awareness about entrepreneurship among students is rising a as result of seminars and programmes being conducted across the state.

Also with industry organisations expressing their willingness to mentor the budding entrepreneurs, Dwivedi says theses are positive signs.

Experts believe slowdown in global scenario impacting job market and dissatisfaction in jobs could be two plausible factors for rising entrepreneurship awareness drives , in recent years

Krishna Tanku Executive Director, Wadhwani Centre for Entrepreneurship Development at ISB (India School of Business), says there are increasing number of students opting for entrepreneurship.

While one element, going by Tanku, could be the tapering of job opportunities due to slowdown, but this is not the driving factor, he believes.

Heightened awareness of entrepreneurship and increasing degree of dissatisfaction in corporate jobs is also driving the entrepreneurship.

Tanku believes it is imperative for a country like India to focus on entrepreneurship, which has to be on sustainable basis.

“It is estimated that every year 14-15 million people enter the job market. Hence in next 10 years we need to create 100-150 million jobs need to be created .”

Tanku believes creating so much jobs by both government and private sector would be challenging.

No private and government channel can create so much job hence focus needs to be on entrepreneurship now. Hence Tanku says it is imperative to grow the entrepreneurship in the country.