PM Launches 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat App Innovation Challenge' | Urges Techies And Startups To Participate

Earlier today, Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted about the new ‘Aatmanirbhar Bharat App Innovation Challenge’. The challenge which was launched through the PM’s tweet challenges Indian Startups and companies to develop ‘Made in India’ applications that will facilitate not only the people of India but the whole world. In his tweet, PM urged all the tech and startup community to come forward and develop world-class mobile applications under the challenge.

The challenge was launched under the Digital India mission by the collaboration of The Ministry of Electronics And IT with The Atal Innovation Mission (AIM) which is an endeavor of Niti Aayog.

In a second tweet, Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged everyone with such a working product or the ideas and vision to create one to come forward and take part in the challenge. He also gave a tagline for this challenge:

Let us Code for an Aatmanirbhar Bharat!

It has been only a few days since the Government of India banned 59 Chinese mobile applications such as TikTok, ShareIt, Xender, etc. from the Indian market. And the Government of India has already started to make India Aatmanirbhar in terms of world-class mobile applications.

"Today, when the entire nation is working towards creating an Aatmanirbhar Bharat, it is a good opportunity to give direction to their efforts, momentum to their hard-work and mentorship to their talent to evolve Apps which can satisfy our market as well as compete with the world.", wrote PM Narendra Modi on his LinkedIn post.

Why Is This Important?

China had huge control over the Indian market until the ban of the 59 Chinese applications a few days ago. These 59 applications contained some applications which were very popular in the Indian market. Some of such popular apps were TikTok, Xender, UC Browser, Shein, Club Factory, and more. While the Indian alternatives of these applications are available to download, they are much behind in terms of quality. Therefore, it was an important decision to launch the challenge.
The challenge will motivate Indian Startups and techies to create such world-class applications that will find top spots in the world market. One more reason is that although Chinese apps have been banned in India, we still have many foreign-based applications that are very popular in India. These include popular social media apps WhatsApp and Instagram, Google apps, and more. Therefore, this decision was made not only for developing Indian alternatives for the 59 Chinese apps that were banned but also to develop apps that can conquer the World market and leave other apps behind.

Although the Chinese apps have been banned by the Government from the Indian market, there are still many apps that Indians use which are not India-based. Therefore, this challenge will prove out to be a good step towards the Aatmanirbhar Bharat movement and the revenue generated by Indian apps will stay in India itself, helping a little to the Economy of India.
PM Narendra Modi informed on his LinkedIn account that the challenge will be run on 2 different tracks. First – To promote existing Indian applications. And Second – To help people and startups to develop new applications in terms of financial and ideation support.

The innovation challenge is being launched in 8 different categories:

1. Office Productivity and Work From Home
2. Social Networking
3. News
4. Games
5. E-Learning
6. Health and Wellness
7. Entertainment
8. Business (including Agritech and Fintech)

The last date for submission of work has been set to 18th July and the work will be judged based on its ease of use, Security Features, Scalability, and Robustness.
Along with the motivation to work, the challenge also offers money prizes to the top 3 contestants in each category along with the top 3 candidates of sub-categories decided by the Jury. The prizes will be as follows:

Along with the prize money, the apps will be given a place on the top leader-boards.

Conclusion

This challenge will motivate many individuals and companies to come forward and use their brains for the benefit of India. It is true that India has brains but lacks the motivation to create such world-class applications. This challenge will give them support as well as the motivation required by them to use their skills towards the betterment of India.