‘India’s role in IT can’t be reversed’

“India is part of the global delivery chain. I don’t think it is reversible,” said Som Mittal, President, National Association of Software and Service Companies (Nasscom) here on Tuesday.
Responding to queries from presspersons after participating in the decennial foundation day celebrations of International Institute of Information Technology (IIIT) here, Mr. Mittal said that the IT industry was growing at 21-24 per cent year-on-year, contributing 5.5 per cent of the gross domestic product (GDP) and exporting software worth $50 billion annually.
To a question on the move of Barack Obama, the Democratic Party’s nominee for the American presidency, to stop incentives to IT companies outsourcing their work, he said: “It is for the U.S. companies, which give a large portion of work for offshoring, to decide. We will wait and watch.”
The U.S. had been an all-free trade country. It had been seen as country working closely with other nations like India.
There was a huge shortage of tech resources. Thousands of tech jobs were being posted on jobsites regularly. He, however, cautioned: “While the first $50 billion came with struggle, but it will be difficult to add the next $100 billion. This is a bigger challenge.”
With a view to creating awareness on the focus of various IT jobs, Nasscom would launch a ‘career guide’ early next year. This would help IT students to know the job requirements and groom themselves industry-ready by the time they completed their studies.
He said that IT companies in India were spending 16-18 weeks for training newly recruited staff spending $1 billion every year. The association was trying to restrict the induction programme to just two weeks, by transferring the longer training to educational institutions.
On the ageing population in Japan and a few other countries as opposed to the growing younger population in India, he said India should derive advantage out of the huge surplus of working class by converting them quickly into world-class technologists.
On the possibility of losses to bigger players due to over-hedging in the wake of weakening rupee, Mr. Mittal said: “Margins were impacted by fluctuating currency. Yet, it is a process. We have to learn lessons and become mature to absorb the economic fluctuations.”

Ref : The Hindu, Wednesday, Sep 03, 2008