Underscoring the significant impact of startups on India's job creation landscape, Union Minister Piyush Goyal emphatically refuted any notion of a slowdown in the country's startup growth trajectory. As of April this year, a substantial cohort of 98,119 officially recognised startups has orchestrated the creation of over 1.034 million direct jobs, a testament articulated by Goyal in his recent address to the Lok Sabha.

Direct jobs created by recognised startups over the last three years have increased. In 2020, recognised startups created 1,59,803 jobs followed by 2,01,144 in 2021 and 2,70,196 in 2022.

According to him sustained efforts of the government under the Startup India initiative led to an increase in the number of recognised startups from 428 in 2016 to over 98 thousand as of April this year.

The Startup India initiative was launched on January 16, 2016, with the intent to build a strong ecosystem for nurturing innovation, and startups and encouraging private investments in the startup ecosystem of the country.

To meet the objectives of the Startup India initiative, the government unveiled an Action Plan for Startups comprising schemes and incentives envisaged to create a vibrant startup ecosystem in the country. The Action Plan comprises 19 action items spanning areas such as “Simplification and handholding”, “Funding support and incentives” and “Industry-academia partnership and incubation”.