Global sourcing is now a key
element of corporate boardroom agency. The Indian IT-enabled and Business
Services (ITES-BPO) have demonstrated superiority, sustained cost advantage and
fundamentally-powered value proposition in ITES. Indian companies are expanding
their service offerings, enabling customers to deepen their offshore
engagements; the shift from low-end business processes to higher-value,
knowledge-based processes is having a positive impact on the overall industry
growth.
The
software and ITES exports from India grew from US$ 12.9 billion in the year
2003-04 to US$ 17.7 billion in 2004-05.
The total software and ITES exports from India is estimated at US$ 23.4
billion during the year 2005-06.
Software and services exports have grown at 32 per cent in dollar terms
during the year 2005-06.
Strong demand
over the past few years has placed India amongst the fastest-growing IT markets
in the Asia-Pacific region. The Indian
software and ITES industry has grown of 28 per cent
during the last 5 years. The industry’s
contribution to the national GDP has risen from 1.2 per cent during the year 1999-2000 to a projected 4.8 per cent
during 2005-06.
Delivery Capabilities
Recognising
the advantages of multi-country service delivery capabilities to better manage
evolving customer requirements and execute end-to-end delivery of some new
services, Indian companies are enhancing their global service delivery
capabilities. It is through a combination of green-field initiatives,
cross-border M&A, partnerships and alliances with local players. Global
software product giants such as Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, etc., have established
their captive development centres in India.
India’s
record on information security ranks better than most locations. The
authorities in India are maintaining a keen emphasis on further
strengthening the information security environment in the country. Specific initiatives underway include
enhancing the legal framework through proposed amendments to the IT Act 2000 –
currently under review by the Government – increasing interaction between
industry players and enforcement agencies to help create greater awareness
about information security issues and facilitate mutual support as and when
required.
Today, a
majority of the companies in India have already aligned their internal processes
and practices to international standards such as ISO, CMM, Six Sigma, etc.,
which has helped establish India as a credible sourcing destination. As of December 2005, over 400 Indian companies
had acquired quality certifications with 82 companies certified at SEI CMM
Level 5 – higher than any other country in the world.
Employment
The total
number of IT and ITES-BPO professionals employed in India is estimated to
have grown from 284,000 in 1999-2000 to 1,287,000 in 2005-06, growing by over
230,000 in the last year alone. In
addition, Indian IT-ITES is estimated to have helped create an additional
3 million job opportunities through indirect and induced employment. Indirect employment includes expenditure on
vendors including telecom, power, construction, facility management, IT transportation,
catering and other services.
Major New Initiatives
The
Information Technology(IT) department has formulated a proposal, as part of
NeGP, to establish 100,000 Common Services Centres (CSCs) in rural areas.
They will serve not only as the
front end for most government services, but also as a means to connect the
citizens of rural India to the World Wide Web. CSC scheme envisages a honeycomb
pattern of 600,000 villages of the country i.e. one CSC village surrounded by
six villages.
The primary
objective of the CSCs is to provide e-government services at the doorstep
of the citizen, by creating
a physical service
delivery infrastructure for accessing e-government
services. The CSCs are envisaged to be a change instrument that would provide
a structured platform for socially inclusive community participation for development.
An individual or organization functioning as change agent would run the CSCs.
It is the community participation and collective action, not ICT alone, which
would lead to sustainable socio-economic development and long-term rural prosperity.
Unique ID
Project
Unique ID (UID) is a Planning Commission initiative steered by the Department
of Information Technology. The purpose of UID is to create a central database
of resident information and assign a Unique Identification number to each such
resident in the country, as a basis for efficient delivery of social and
welfare services. The Unique ID will provide an easy and common means of
identification of all the residents of the country by all government agencies,
thereby enhancing the efficiency, transparency, reliability and effectiveness
of the delivery of public services.
This in turn
would authenticate every person’s entitlement to government services and benefits
through a single Centralized system rather than each government department
investing in creating infrastructure, systems and procedures for identifying
and verifying entitlement of residents under its schemes, individually and
independently.
Policy Initiatives
Easing the
hurdles coming in the way of establishing Fabs in India, Government of India is
likely to come out with a special package of incentives in this direction.
A proposal
for Electronics & IT Hardware Manufacturing Policy is also under
consideration, which is aiming for rationalization of Tariff Structure on
capital goods, and inputs, unification of manufacturing for domestic market and
exports, registration of international patents, transfer of state-of-the-art
technology (TOT) and Research & Development, etc.
As a result
of the efforts taken by the Department, India has become a major destination
for FDI investments in Information Communication Technology sector.
World leaders in ICT like Intel, Cisco, SemIndia-AMD, Microsoft, Motorola,
Ericsson, Nokia, Kyocera, Siemens, LG, Samsung, etc., have announced large
investment plans for India in hardware manufacturing or chip design or R&D
or to develop software products.
Indian Languages
The
benefits of Information Technology can reach the common man in India only when
the digitalized information is available in all Indian languages. At present,
the success of IT and its rewards are mostly limited to the largest urban
areas, the educated and English speakers.
To enable
wide proliferation of ICT in Indian languages, the Department of Information
Technology has taken a major initiative to make available tools and fonts
in various Indian Languages freely to the general public. All Indian languages
are expected to be covered in the next one year.
Information Technology Act
The Information Technology Act was
enacted in the year 2000, primarily to boost e-commerce in the country and
also to create an enabling environment for e-Governance in the country. The Act,
provided a legal framework for transactions carried out using computers and
the internet technologies. The IT
Act was enacted keeping in view the technology directions and scenario existing
at that time. As the technology is
an ever-evolving process for providing efficient and cost effective options,
it was felt that a fresh look to the technology driven law needs to be given.
Concerns have been raised both within the country as well as by the
customers abroad regarding adequacy of data protection and privacy laws in
the country. A need is, therefore, felt to strengthen the
legislation pertaining to data protection and privacy. The security practices and procedures are needed
to be prescribed to be followed by body corporates and organizations and to
enquire personal information of customers. The result was the Information
Technology Amendment Bill was
SV/AB/RTS/VN
SS-30/SF-30/22.01.2007
(Release ID :24250)