Srinagar, May 13 -- By Khalid Mustafa

Jammu and Kashmir's startup surge has generated excitement inside government offices, university campuses, and business circles.

More than a thousand ventures now stand registered in the Union Territory, marking a sharp departure from the years when entrepreneurship remained limited to small family businesses and conventional commerce.

Investors talk about innovation, policymakers mention growth, and young founders speak the language of scale, technology, and disruption.

A harder reality sits beneath that optimism.

Large numbers of educated young people still leave the region every year for Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Pune, Dubai, and Doha. Engineering graduates prepare for coding interviews outside th...