Synergising Technical Education and Incubated Entrepreneurship in India:A Strategic Approach

Abstract

Education is the most important resource in any country. It has multiplying effects on all facets of development in a society and among various educational resources; engineering education holds the key to economic viability of a nation. In an age of quality, the vitality of engineering education is facing considerable uncertainty. There is a major concern about just where the future of engineering education is heading. New education policy of India has resulted in a mushroom growth of engineering institutes, leading to lakhs of engineering graduates passing out every year. But there is a dismal gap in employment demand corresponding to this enormous supply. Our educational planners must develop new strategies to optimally utilize this vast pool of talent and expertise by exploring new avenues in technopreneurship as engineering education has an indomitable role in entrepreneurship development. Engineering graduates in India have abundance of entrepreneurial aptitude and capability, though they lack proper stimulation and direction. Rich resources, vast markets on account of dense population and government s favourable policies have made India a country of opportunities. In this turbulent economic scenario, business incubation is recently emerging as a strategic tool to propagate entrepreneurship in a big way among engineering graduates. The paper dwells on future role of technical education in assimilating entrepreneurial passion of engineering graduates into incubated business. A conceptual model has been proposed for technical institutions to help in downsizing technology directly to masses to improve entrepreneurial culture in the country.