Businessman Ashneer Grover reacted to union minister Piyush Goyal's remarks on Indian startups on Friday, saying politicians are the only people in the country who need a "reality check".
Speaking at the Startup Mahakumbh 2025 in New Delhi on April 3, Goyal urged the startup community in India to shift their focus from grocery delivery and ice cream making to the high-tech sector, such as semiconductors.
He also compared Indian startups with those in China, pointing out that “the other side” is working on “robotics, machine learning, 3D manufacturing, and next-generation factories."
Reacting to Goyal's remarks, Ashneer Grover pointed out that startups in China also started with food delivery and subsequently turned towards technology.“The only people in India who need a ‘reality check’ are its politicians. Everyone else is living in the absolute reality of India,” Grover wrote on X.
The former managing director of BharatPe also suggested that it may be time to change the public discourse in India from “history to science.”
“China also had food delivery first and then evolved to deep tech. It’s great to aspire for what they’ve done - maybe time for politicians to aspire for 10%+ economic growth rate for 20 years flat before chiding today’s job creators. Maybe time to change ‘public discourse’ from history to science!” Grover added.
Piyush Goyal's remark
On Thursday, Piyush Goyal asked India's startup community to focus more on the tech sector, like semiconductors, machine learning, robotics, and artificial intelligence (AI) as compared to grocery delivery and ice cream making.
{{/usCountry}}On Thursday, Piyush Goyal asked India's startup community to focus more on the tech sector, like semiconductors, machine learning, robotics, and artificial intelligence (AI) as compared to grocery delivery and ice cream making.
{{/usCountry}}Goyal argued that luxury consumer brands created by the children of billionaires aren't to be mistaken for real startups.
"Are we going to be happy being delivery boys and girls... Is that the destiny of India? This is not a startup, this is entrepreneurship... What the other side is doing -- robotics, machine learning, 3D manufacturing and next generation factories," Goyal said.
Earlier today, Zepto CEO Aadit Palicha, in an X post, claimed that his company, which he also co-founded, has created almost 1.5 Lakh jobs and generated nearly “ ₹1,000+ Crores of tax contribution to the government per year.”
“It is easy to criticise consumer internet startups in India, especially when you compare them to the deep technical excellence being built in US/China…" he said.