RKVY-RAFTAAR Agri-Business Incubator (R-ABI), IIT (BHU) Varanasi

Pick the right route in

• You have an agri idea but no product yet: ANKURAN, the pre-seed route.
• You already have a minimum viable product and want to scale: PRASFUTAN, the seed route.
• You are a student with an agri-business idea: SRIJAN, which does not require you to be a registered start-up.

All three are applied for through the same cohort form, so read all three descriptions before you pick — you are choosing the stage you are at, not a separate application.

How applications work

• Intakes are cohort-based and numbered, not rolling. There is no open window between cohorts.
• One online form covers all three programmes for a given cohort, and it is announced on the incubator's own site.
• The window for the most recent cohort has closed, so watch the site and write to rabi@iitbhu.ac.in to ask when the next one opens.
• Office hours are Monday to Friday, 9:30 am to 6:00 pm.

Check you clear the gates first

• Your project must be in agriculture or an allied sector. This is the one rule with no flexibility.
• You do not need an agriculture degree, a specific qualification, or any connection to IIT (BHU).
• There is no upper age limit, but you cannot apply as a minor.
• You can apply with an unregistered but operating venture. You cannot be paid without registering, so start the registration if you expect to reach the funding stage.
• The funded routes use the DPIIT definition of a start-up. Confirm you fit it before you build a plan around the grant.

Plan for the training phase

• Training is compulsory and happens at the incubator in Varanasi. Budget the time before you apply, not after you are selected.
• The founder does not have to attend personally — a core team member may, which matters if you cannot leave operations for weeks.
• The incubator's pages give different lengths for this phase. Ask the centre what the current cohort's schedule is rather than assuming.
• Sessions are run in Hindi and English.

What selection looks for

• The R-ABI Incubation Committee screens applications, then reviews how far you got during the training period. Progress over those weeks is explicitly part of the decision, so treat the residency as the assessment rather than as a course.
• Selected proposals are forwarded to the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers' Welfare for funding, which adds a step you do not control. Expect the timeline from selection to first tranche to be longer than the programme itself.
• Funding is released in tranches against progress, not upfront.
• The centre's portfolio is dominated by organic food, agri-input, dairy, post-harvest processing and farm-machinery ventures with real physical products — useful signal for how your idea will read to the committee.

The RKVY-RAFTAAR Agri-Business Incubator (R-ABI) at IIT (BHU) Varanasi is a government-funded agri-business incubator on the Indian Institute of Technology (BHU) campus in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh. The Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers' Welfare sanctioned it in January 2019 under the Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojna — Remunerative Approaches for Agriculture and Allied Sector Rejuvenation (RKVY-RAFTAAR) scheme, and IIT (BHU)'s Ideation Innovation and Incubation (I-3) Foundation lists it as one of its units. It works only with agriculture and allied-sector ventures, and says it aims to build a start-up ecosystem in the Eastern Uttar Pradesh region.

One centre, not the national scheme

RKVY-RAFTAAR sanctioned agri-business incubators at agricultural universities, ICAR institutes and technical institutes across India, so several centres share the R-ABI name. This page is the centre hosted at IIT (BHU) Varanasi. Its programmes, intake dates, committee and contact inbox are its own, and applying here does not put you in front of any other R-ABI. If you are looking for a different one, apply to that host institute directly.

How the programmes work

The centre runs three named programmes. ANKURAN is the pre-seed or idea-to-product route, for farmers, students and young people with an innovative idea in agriculture and allied sectors. PRASFUTAN is the seed or product-to-market route, for start-ups that already have a minimum viable product and want to scale. SRIJAN supports students taking an agri-business idea towards a real business, product or technology, and is the one route where the applicant does not need to be a registered start-up.

All three open together under a single numbered cohort. Selected applicants for the pre-seed and seed routes go through a training and residency phase at the incubator before any funding decision is made. The incubator's own pages are inconsistent about how long that phase runs — the programmes page describes a one-month orientation and residency, while its answers page and the I-3 Foundation page both describe two months — so treat the length as something to confirm with the centre before you plan around it. Training is compulsory, and may be attended by the founder or by a core team member rather than the founder personally. It is held at the incubator in Varanasi, in Hindi and English. The incubator has also said training was run virtually during the pandemic, and that some parts of a residency package depend on the programme being held in person.

On completion, start-ups that show progress over the training period and meet the R-ABI Incubation Committee's criteria are put forward for grant-in-aid. The grant covers a share of the approved project cost and is released in tranches rather than as a lump sum, with the pre-seed and seed routes using different tranche splits. The money comes from the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers' Welfare through the incubator, so the incubator forwards selected proposals to the Ministry rather than releasing funds on its own authority.

Who can apply

The project must be in agriculture or an allied sector; that is the hard gate. Beyond it the stated rules are unusually open. There is no minimum qualification and no maximum age, but an applicant must not be a minor. Applicants from any academic background may apply, whether or not they studied agriculture, and applicants do not have to be students or alumni of IIT (BHU). A venture that is operating but not yet registered may take part in the programme, but must be registered to receive funding, and the DPIIT definition of a start-up applies to the funded routes. Students applying through SRIJAN do not need to be registered as a start-up.

How to apply

Applications open per cohort through one online application form that covers SRIJAN, ANKURAN and PRASFUTAN together, announced on the incubator's own site. The application window for the most recent cohort has closed, so the practical step today is to watch the site for the next one and write to the centre's enquiry inbox in the meantime. Screening is done by the R-ABI Incubation Committee, which is also the body that reviews progress during the residency.

Facilities and support

Start-ups selected by the Incubation Committee get incubation space at the centre, along with support for lab testing and certification, training and mentoring sessions, and room to work on the product. For seed-stage start-ups the centre also describes market and investor linkages. The centre posts office hours of Monday to Friday, 9:30 am to 6:00 pm.

Track record

The incubator publishes its portfolio by programme: its pre-seed page names 32 companies and its seed page names 28, with one company appearing on both, for 59 distinct named ventures. Named portfolio companies include Agrifeeder Agricultural Services, Gir Organics, Dungtech, Oorvi Sustainable Concepts, Livecow and Climagro Analytics. The centre has reported publicly that 24 start-ups presented at the cohort-7 selection committee meeting in January 2025 and that nine of them — three at seed stage and six at pre-seed — were cleared for final funding. Its own posts run up to cohort 7 while the most recent application form was numbered cohort 9, so the public record on the site lags its intakes.

Who runs it and where

Prof. Rajnesh Tyagi is the Principal Investigator for the R-ABI at IIT (BHU) Varanasi, with Dr. Abhishek Singh as Business Manager, Mr. Atanu Chakravorty as Assistant Manager and Mr. Arjun Tiwari as Business Executive. Prof. Amit Patra, the Director of IIT (BHU) Varanasi, is listed on the centre's leadership page. The centre sits adjacent to the Department of Chemical Engineering and Technology, opposite the IIT-BHU Proctor Office on the Indian Institute of Technology (BHU) Varanasi campus. The site carries a blog section where cohort announcements and events are posted, and a careers page that lists contract positions under the RKVY-RAFTAAR project when the centre is hiring — posts there are temporary and co-terminus with the project.