India’s academic institutes are emerging as the strongest supporters of entrepreneurship, in more ways than one

Dr Mukesh Chaturvedi, Dean of Academics at Delhi’s premier management institute, IMT Ghaziabad, was used to a standard answer from his students on their five-year plans. They all wanted to be in high-paying, globe-trotting, senior managerial jobs. However, lately, he has been getting startling replies. “Many don’t want to take these jobs anymore. Instead, they tell me they want to be the ones creating such jobs,” he says. It is a feedback Dr Chaturvedi and the institute have taken seriously. IMT is opening an incubation centre in August to support aspiring entrepreneurs with their startup ideas. “There is undoubtedly a strong pressure on B Schools like ours to facilitate entrepreneurship,” he says.

This pressure is also being felt by several member institutes of the National Entrepreneurship Network, a Wadhwani Foundation initiative that inspires and supports new and future entrepreneurs, and they are gearing up to meet it with an assortment of courses, activities and initiatives on entrepreneurship, of a kind never witnessed before. 390 institutes have trained their faculty in entrepreneurship education, and 380 institutes have established Entrepreneurship Cells to engage students in entrepreneurship activities. 123 institutes are working directly with entrepreneurs, while 33 run campus companies, providing a hands-on experience to students in running startups. 22 institutes have opened incubation centres that provide infrastructure and mentoring support to startups.

Explains Sunita Singh, Senior Director and Co-founder, NEN: “When NEN was launched in 2003, there were barely five institutes engaged in entrepreneurship. Today, it has reached a tipping point. Among the 515 member institutes in the NEN community, over 230 are running programs that go beyond creating awareness about entrepreneurship, providing direct support to new and aspiring entrepreneurs, often reaching out beyond their campus walls.”

Support comes in the form of courses, workshops, mentoring help, connection to experts, concept testing, refining B Plans and networking with potential investors and customers.

Pressure Points

Students are the prime drivers fuelling the demand for such initiatives. Exposure to entrepreneurial thinking through their E Club activities has contributed significantly, finds Anuradha Parashar, Director of Corporate Affairs and Student Mentoring and NEN Faculty Leader at SRM University, Chennai. By involving themselves in their E Cells, participating in workshops, interacting with entrepreneurs and working in campus companies, students gain the essential knowledge and skills and are confident to explore opportunities on their own by the time they graduate. “In fact, this is when they need even more help and support – for which they look to us,” says Anuradha, who was instrumental in setting up the incubator at SRM University in 2009.

Growing interest in ‘intrapreneurship’ among students is another trigger, notes Prof Rakesh Basant, Chairperson, Centre for Innovation, Incubation and Entrepreneurship at Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. Entrepreneurial thinking is turning out to be not just beneficial to entrepreneurs – it is also helpful for those seeking good placement, with more and more companies demanding entrepreneurially-inclined professionals. Students too are choosing jobs that give them the flexibility and space of being entrepreneurial, he says.

On a macro level, Dr Somayajulu Garimella, Professor and NEN Faculty Leader at International Management Institute, Delhi points to the job market in India. Students are beginning to realize that there are not enough jobs, and going forward, the scarcity will only increase. “They have discovered entrepreneurship as a way to not only cope with the competitiveness in the job market, but also expand it by creating more jobs,” he explains.

The way ahead

While institutional support to entrepreneurship is gaining strength, it is necessary for institutes to collaborate with each other to sustain the momentum, believes Prof Basant. With infrastructure and resources being limited, active networking across institutes and leveraging each other’s mentoring and funding resources will be the most effective way to scale up, he recommends.

Laura Parkin, CEO and Co-founder of NEN, finds the trend ‘positive and promising’. “As far as institutional commitment to entrepreneurship is concerned, what we are seeing is not the end of a bell curve – but the bulk. The crowds are coming in. We have 75,000 students in our NEN community today who are actively engaging in entrepreneurship activities - gaining knowledge, skills and confidence while doing so. What they will bring to the Indian economy once they graduate will be exciting to see!”.

The ‘E’ Effect

(Based on National Entrepreneurship Network records)