Conference of IT Ministers next month — Mahajan

Mahajan said while tremendous opportunities were opening up for India, which had a one-time chance to be a global leader, the country would have to keep pace with the growing demand for human resource potential. He appealed to all Chief Ministers to double the number of engineering colleges in the states to meet the demand.

India produced more than 100,000 IT professionals every year, but the United States needed 100,000 additional hands, Germany 20,000 and Japan 45,000. "Our education system is not yet ready to meet this tremendous demand. Every state will have to double its engineering colleges and spend more on human resources. We should not lose the opportunity due to lack of education or priorities," he said.

Mahajan assured Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi of the Union Government’s support to the state’s efforts to promote IT. Commending the progress made by Tamil Nadu in the sector, he said it was breathing down the neck of Maharasthra and might soon surpass it.

On chief guest Karunanidhi’s request that the Centre should set up an Indian Institute of Information Technology and Managment here on the lines of the one set up recently in Gwalior, Mahajan said it came under the Human Resource Development Ministry and he would take up the matter with it.

Karunanidhi presented the national and state-level awards of the STPI for software export performance to various IT companies.

Chief Minister M Karunanidhi said the Tamil Nadu government will extend financial support to the Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) to establish international data links throughout the state to take IT to the rural areas.

He said STPI had come foward to provide data links realising that widespread availability of international data links was an important precondition for taking IT to people in rural areas.

With the government deciding to lend the necessary financial support to the STPI, data links were expected to come up in Madurai, Tiruchirappalli, Salem and Tirunelveli before the end of this year, Karunanidhi said.

The Chief Minister asked the Union Government for support in its IT promotion efforts by encouraging the establishment of a landing point in Chennai for inter-continental, underseas fibre optic cables and helping the coverage of all development blocks in the state under the Central sector scheme of providing block-level community information centres.

He outlined the strengths of Tamil Nadu, citing its high growth rate of more than six per cent per year and its credit-deposit ratio of 90 per cent, the highest in the country, and its high literacy rate.