Karnataka plans to incubate 20,000 tech startups by 2020: Siddaramaiah

Bengaluru: The startups are coming, a wave of them, but will they get trapped in the potholes dotting every road in the city? That was the fear uppermost in the minds of those present at the state’s annual IT summit on Tuesday when Chief Minister Siddaramaiah announced that Karnataka plans to incubate 20,000 tech startups by 2020, creating 6 lakh direct and 12 lakh indirect new jobs.

At the inauguration of the 18th edition of BangaloreITE.biz, he said, “The government is aware that the growing city needs upgradation of infrastructure.”

Chief Secretary Kaushik Mukherjee focused on policies that help build innovation and startup culture. Stating that it was ‘a bad idea’ for startups to be controlled by the government, he felt the role of the government should be limited to hand-holding than taking things to a stage where ‘entrepreneurs are held by their neck.’

“Government should be like the person who teaches a kid to ride a bicycle. After a while, it should release control. Not sit on the backseat and go along for a ride,” he said.

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