Amit Shah lauds Cabinet’s decision to approve Rs 2,750 crore for AIM 2.0

New Delhi: Union Home Minister Amit Shah said Monday that the Atal Innovation Mission (AIM) 2.0 would ‘turbocharge’ the creative potential of the young and commended the Cabinet’s decision to award Rs 2750 crore for the project.

The Union Home Minister thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the decision in a post on X.

“The Union Cabinet’s decision to approve the Rs 2750 crore Atal Innovation Mission 2.0 initiative will turbocharge the innovative power of our youth by extending the culture of thinking outside the box to new regions and fields,” he wrote in X.

The Union Home Minister went on to say, “Thanks to PM Shri Narendra Modi Ji for the visionary initiative.”

The continuation of the Union Cabinet’s flagship program, the Atal Innovation Mission (AIM), under the auspices of NITI Aayog, was authorized earlier in the day by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The program has been given a budget of Rs 2750 crore for the year ending March 31, 2028, and its area of activity has been expanded.

AIM 2.0 is a step towards a “Viksit Bharat” (Developed India), which seeks to deepen, develop, and broaden India’s already thriving innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem, according to an official statement.

The government’s dedication to developing a strong innovation and entrepreneurial environment in India is shown by the clearance. Given that India has the third-largest start-up ecosystem in the world and ranks 39th on the Global Innovation Index, it is anticipated that the Atal Innovation Mission’s next phase (AIM 2.0) would increase India’s competitiveness internationally. AIM’s continued existence will directly support the development of better employment, cutting-edge goods, and high-impact services across a variety of industries.

AIM 2.0 represents a fundamental change in the mission’s strategy while expanding on the achievements of AIM 1.0, such as Atal Tinkering Labs (ATL) and Atal Incubation Centers (AIC). AIM 2.0 will trial new initiatives aimed at addressing ecosystem gaps and scaling achievements via the federal and state governments, business, academia, and community, in contrast to AIM 1.0, which entailed executing programs that developed innovation infrastructure to boost India’s then-nascent ecosystem.

The statement said that AIM 2.0 aims to improve the quality of ‘output,’ increase input, and increase the success rate in order to fortify India’s innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem.

Furthermore, “One Nation, One Subscription,” a new central sector initiative to provide nationwide access to academic research papers and journal publications, has been authorized by the Union Cabinet.

A straightforward, user-friendly, and entirely digital approach would be used to run the program, according to the Information and Broadcasting Minister, who briefed the media on the cabinet choices.

For the central government’s R&D labs and higher education institutions, this will be a “One Nation, One Subscription” facility.