As a student who will be graduating from a premier business school in 2019, what are my prospective earning avenues in the forthcoming years? What is it that I can, or rather should, expect from the Budget 2016?
I will either seek a decently rewarding employment in an existing company, or test the waters in entrepreneurship.
Entrepreneurship
To begin with the latter, campaigns like ‘Start-Up India’ and ‘Digital India’ seem to provide a conducive and accommodative economic and political environment for beginners. However, a start-up is not just about sanctions and funding. The real struggle lies thereafter — in the functioning.
I used the phrase ‘test the waters’ for a reason. Most start-ups have very young, often inexperienced people at the helm of affairs, and they need proper guidance to keep them in the right direction. The government’s announcement of coming up with around 35 incubators and accelerators in this regard should find significant and quantitative mention in the budget, in terms of respective rollouts so that this scheme doesn’t just remain on paper.
The ‘Angel Tax’ and ‘Capital Gains Tax’ have taxed the nation enough, with many entrepreneurs registering their start-ups in foreign countries. Such regimes need to be either modified, or be done away with. The incorporation of the long awaited GST in the system would give an unprecedented boost to business and trading across the country, thanks to the uniformity and simplifications it brings with it, not to mention the reduction in tax evasions too.
Given all of the above, there may still be reasons enough for entrepreneurs to shut down their existing business and look for alternatives, unless winding-up procedures are simplified and financially feasible. The budget should allow for necessary tax-breaks and exemptions, along with liberal shutting down procedures, to make all of this possible.
What I look for
As a job seeker, I would not only expect a job description I am capable of fulfilling, but one that is satisfactory to me and provides scope of enhancing my career growth. The ‘Make in India’ campaign has got everyone’s hopes high. However, a few questions that leave me dubious of its delivery are:
What level and type of skills will the employers look for?
Is the existing infrastructure enough to accommodate the projected growth in manufacturing industries?
If yes, then how ecologically sustainable is it?
What are the prospects of progress in the corporate sector so developed, for me as a management graduate?
Another sphere where India has immense potential but has relatively lesser investments and incentives is Research and Development. A budget that allocates enough funds under streamlined schemes to promote research and innovation is what India needs right now.
If the Budget 2016 session succeeds in answering at least a few of the above and similar concerns such as transparency and stability of the taxing system, and India’s ascent in the Ease of Doing Business rankings, it would be reassuring.