The most consequential backer of Indian venture funds over the past decade has not been a venture capital firm.
It has been the Government of India, and it has spent that decade going to considerable lengths to make sure nobody could accuse it of picking companies.
The numbers are larger than the ecosystem tends to assume.
SIDBI’s annual report records gross commitments of ₹11,808 crore across 153 alternative investment funds under a single scheme, a target it passed ahead of schedule.
Those funds had in turn put roughly ₹25,548 crore into 1,371 startups by the end of 2025.
