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Needed: An Indian Marketplace for Ideas

Saurabh Garg muses on the need to foster innovation in India and wonders if there could be a market where people with complementary skills can come together and make ideas happen. Just as markets have buyers and sellers, Garg highlights the possibility of a market where intellectual capital can be leveraged into action. In India, there are so many different pilot projects and one-offs on the ground, but a knowledge base to allow an exchange of ideas is often absent. Garg discusses the crux of the issue:

People are scattered across geography and time. And these pieces don’t know that they are parts of something bigger and they all can play a role. Even if they realize that they can take their ideas to fruition, they don’t know where and how to find complementary skill-sets. We need something, a system probably to help these people come together.

What would the shape of such a system look like? Garg mentions barCamps, MOMO, and other websites that create forums, but still may not completely fulfill the gap. What kind of mechanisms are needed to ensure that Indians can gain access to each other and new ideas, as well as obtain the resources to implement their plans?


Shital Shah

Shital’s family immigrated from India when she was only four years old, but her heart and soul still remain there. She went on to graduate from Northwestern University and returned to India as an Indicorps fellow. She completed her Master of Public Administration from New York University’s Wagner School of Public Service, specializing in International Development. In the past few years, she has been involved with the Washington Leadership Program, InSPIRE (a summer program for South Asian youth), and internships with Acumen Fund, the UN, Oxfam International, the World Bank, and New Visions for Public Schools. She currently works on savings, technology, and mobile banking projects in South Asia with ShoreBank International.