EMERGENCE OF SMALL ENTREPRENEURS AND RURAL INDUSTRIALISATION

Entrepreneurs play an important role in economic and industrial development. It is the entrepreneurs who rather than working as an employee, founds and runs a small business, assuming all the risks and rewards of the venture. There are new entrepreneurs gradually emerging in Assam but there has been no sociological study. The aim of this article is to study the entrepreneurship and small business in Assam. The paper discusses the challenges faced by rural handloom entrepreneurs of an important weaving centre of Assam which is Sualkuchi. The entrepreneurs here face various problems in day to day work. Every flourishing business has its own kinds of problems. Some of the major problems faced by rural entrepreneurs in this part of the region are such as; paucity of funds, infrastructural problems, marketing problems, management problems and so on. It further discusses the opportunities present for these rural entrepreneurs in marketing their handloom products and also attempts to explore social and cultural context of entrepreneurial development in Sualkuchi. Rural industries promote entrepreneurial development in the rural sector. Rural industrialisation hence fosters economic development of rural areas and this curbs rural urban migration on one hand and also reduces disproportionate growth of towns and cities, social tensions, environmental pollution etc. on the other. Rural youths need to be motivated to take up entrepreneurship as a career, with training and sustaining support systems providing all necessary assistance.