Digitally yours–Maharashtra

Maharashtra is all geared to get a new face-lift with
government and corpo-rate aiming to make the state completely digital. The state
that is so far known for nightlife will soon be recognized as a digital state.

Highlighting his campaign to close the ‘digital divide’,
Sushil Kumar Shinde, Chief Minister made a passionate plea to the IT community
at a CII and Gove-rnment of Maharashtra co-hos-ted event ‘Digital Maharashtra’,
asking for help in the interest of not only society but the new economy as well.

The appearance marked the first time a sitting chief minister
has addressed a major IT event and Shinde recognized the venue as an opportunity
to reach a good portion of the major industry players. He exhorted industry
leaders to continue the support that has propelled Maharashtra to the top of the
leader board in IT and related services in India.

With Mumbai and Pune being at the forefront of this
juggernaut, over 25 percent of professionals in the field of IT and BPO come
from these two cities. "The major thrust area for the government was to
push not just these two cities in the state with infusion of infra-structure and
the provision of various incentives," Shinde said.

Foremost, Shinde asked that IT business leaders understand
that closing the digital divide is not only a social responsibi-lity but also an
economic nece-ssity to keep the digital eco-nomy moving forward. In his address,
CEO and President of US based Incoda Corporation Bernard Palowitch Jr. sought to
dispel the misconceptions that have been created by the media and negative
publicity gene-rated by some states in the US about outsourcing. He referred to
the study done in the US recently that proved that outsourcing of backend pro-cesses
to India actually resulted in the generation of revenue for the US. While India
generates 33 cents to the dollar, the US actually has a generation of $1.33 per
every dollar spent.

In his keynote address, TCS CEO S Ramadorai said that
Maharashtra is a front-runner in various fields. Prominent among them are IT
related acti-vities. He also pointed out various initiatives undertaken by TCS
in providing literacy among the masses.

Earlier in his opening remarks, Zensar Technologies MD Ganesh
Natrajan commen-ted on Maharashtra’s share in the IT market where around 50
percent of the hardware and 25 percent of the software indu-stry has
contributions from Maharashtra. He also mentio-ned that the state is the leader
in the call center industry and is leading the pack in innova-tion and creation
of new emp-loyment avenues for thousands of English speaking graduates that come
out our education system every year.

(CyberMedia News Service)