In Bengaluru vs Hyderabad, India's Silicon Valley Is Falling Behind

Bengaluru: Till a few years ago, "Being Bangalored" was a term used to describe an area losing a business or jobs to the newly-minted Silicon Valley of India.

From the gleaming campus of Infosys and other high-tech firms in electronics city on Hosur Road, the sprawling Wipro campus on Sarjapur road - and the multi-nationals that converted the farms of Whitefield into packed urban chaos - they all chose Bengaluru to operate from.

Bengaluru may still be the cradle of start-up India, but its thunder has been stolen on a crucial front - Karnataka placed 13th on the new national rankings for ease-of-business. Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, who jointly hold IT hub Hyderabad as their capital - were the toppers.

R.V Deshpande, Karnataka's Industry Minister, says yes, Bengaluru has taken a beating, but finds a reason to cheer. "It is a fact, that we are on the 13th position - but it is also a fact that we are number 1 in investments. Karnataka is number 1 with 1 lakh crore and more investments cleared. And all these states from Telangana to Andhra to Gujarat, are far, far behind," he told NDTV.

Last year, Karnataka placed ninth on the ease-of-business list.

The Congress government in Karnataka also questions the parameters for the ranking by the Commerce Ministry in consultation with the World Bank - with its stress on the extent to which business-related facilities and services are available online -an odd position to take given that Bengaluru was for years seen as the home of Indian software.

What the government does cede is that infrastructure - including miserable roads that saw people fishing in water-filled craters this monsoon - has let the city down. "The industrial development was more faster than the infrastructure, which could not keep pace," said the minister, adding that corruption is also a deterrent for corporate growth.

"Corruption is again a cancer, a disease, I fail to understand," said the Industry Minister. Then the caveat that is unlikely to find its way into brochures: "But Karnataka is definitely is better than many states."

A businesswoman who invests in start-ups, Dr Som Singh suggested that for those who're trying to fathom Bengaluru's fall from grace, just look around The city's traffic is notoriously unmanageable. " People were rooting for Work From Home, now it is is Work From Traffic. In the same amount of time it will take me to commute from Koramangala to Hebbal (two parts of the city), I can take a flight to Kolkata and come back."

There's another point of concern for entrepreneurs, she said: "There is too much of government interference in setting up small businesses in Karnataka."

While the government offers an array of reasons for the problems cited, when you place No 13, well, you can come off sounding like a sore loser.