• The Telangana government has launched India’s first social innovation centre – The ‘Kakatiya Hub For Social Innovation’ in Nizamabad on Feb 5, 2017.
• Telangana IT Secretary Jayesh Ranjan made this announcement at the one-day Development Dialogue, an international social entrepreneurship ecosystem conference hosted by Kakatiya Sandbox.
• Jayesh Ranjan said the ‘Kakatiya Hub For Social Innovation’ funded by the Telangana government and implemented through Kakatiya Sandbox will function as a rural incubator to encourage entrepreneurship at the grassroots level.
• Problems are to be solved in rural areas and the people who are familiar with them should be in the best position to solve the problems.
• However, rural entrepreneurs need a structured guidance and an incubator is the best way of providing a necessary ecosystem and support to them.”
• Rural incubator in Telangana will be run exactly in the same as any other high-end incubator like the T-Hub, the country’s biggest, located in Hyderabad.
• Indian-American entrepreneur Raju Reddy, co-founder of Kakatiya Sandbox, Dr. ‘Desh’ Deshpande, founder of Deshpande Foundation, Redbus founder Phanindra Sama, who is also the co-founder of Kakatiya Sandbox, welcomed the government’s decision.
• Dr. ‘Desh’ Deshpande, founder of Deshpande Foundation introduced the Sandbox concept in India 10 years ago.

Source:Businessline