NITI Aayog's Kant answers Shekhar Kapur's 'why did we not develop our own Twitter & Zoom?'

Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant on Sunday lauded India for providing a free and fair marketplace for competition, calling the country a 'phenomenal example' of a place where domestic and international brands co-exist. Comparing Indian companies with their international counterparts like Ola and Uber, OYO and AirBnB, PhonePe and Google Pay, the think tank CEO asked for an example of any other country that would allow domestic and foreign players to coexist in such a way. 

Kant's tweet came in response to Shekhar Kapur's tweet stressing on the need to harness India's IT manpower and develop indigenous replacements of popular apps such as Twitter, Facebook and TikTok. He stated that the Centre's 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat' initiative was a step in the right direction.

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'Aatmanirbhar Bharat App Innovation Challenge' 

In order to harness India's IT potential, PM Modi last month launched the 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat App Innovation Challenge' to facilitate the techies and start-up community to create world-class 'Made in India' Apps. Taking to Twitter, Prime Minister said that there is immense enthusiasm among the tech and start-up community to create world-class 'Made in India' Apps.

"Nowadays, we are seeing huge interest and enthusiasm among the start-up and tech ecosystem to innovate, develop and promote homegrown apps. 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." He wrote that this challenge will run in two tracks--Promotion of existing apps and development of new apps," said PM Modi.

This challenge will run in two tracks- promotion of existing apps and development of new apps. The outcome of this challenge will be to give better visibility and clarity to existing Apps to achieve their goals and to create tech products to find solutions to tech conundrums. 

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