Many new des-tinations are emerging after Bangalore put India on the global
IT map in the early 1990’s. However, Karnataka is not willing to rest on its
laurels and is keen on further infrastructure development to support the fast
paced developments. DB Inamdar, Karnataka Minis-ter for IT was on a visit to
Kochi in connection with the inauguration of a new IT facility. Later in
Thiruvanan-thapuram he shared some of his thoughts with R Sree-kumar of
CyberMedia News Service.
What is the present IT scenario in Karnataka?
Existing companies are expanding. Regarding new investments on an average
six new MNCs per month open their centers in Bangalore.
Why do you think Karnataka continues to attract so much
new investments?
HR is our greatest strength. Centers of excellence like Indian Institute of
Science (IISc) and Indian Institute of Informa-tion Technology (IIIT) and
lar-gest network of self-financing engineering colleges have also helped. There
are a number of embedded design labs, chip design (86 companies), auto-motive
design, biotechnology R&D companies in Bangalore that belong to the higher
end of the value chain.
Has IT development occurred by neglecting other priority
sectors?
Karnataka has always prima-rily focused on rural develop-ments, roads,
education and women empowerment. Our large number of e-governance projects such
as Bhoomi also bear commitment to the com-mon man. 1,800 of our schools are
computerized. In all, the assembly constituencies a program has been initiated
for training the youth in compu-ters, already 4,00,000 have been trained in an
effort to bridge the digital divide.
How are you tackling the gro-wth problems in Bangalore?
The need for an international airport is our topmost priority. A new airport
with 100 percent private equity has been propo-sed and is pending clearance with
the Union Civil Aviation Ministry. We are building a 110 sq km. IT corridor
between Electronic City and Whitefield with the help of a Singapore Consortium
where government will build roads and parks and new townships would emerge with
private investment. This should be ready by 2012.
There is a perception that much of Karnataka’s IT
achievements have occurred without much governmental involvement?
It’s not true. For eg Infosys received its first venture fund-ing from the
state-owned Karnataka State Finance Corpo-ration in its initial years. Gov-ernment
is acting only as a faci-litator and ease out the prob-lems raised by the
industry.