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Software industry cautions on competition

Phiroz Vandrevala, chairman of the National Association of Software and Service Companies, said that India's cost-effective engineers could face challenges from China and Russia as skilled workers in these countries improve English- language skills, a key advantage that India currently enjoys.

"It is important that we keep our momentum and continue to enjoy the support we have," he said at the annual NASSCOM 2001 conference India, Israel and Ireland have been among leading players outside Western Europe and the United States in building on the advantages of skilled workers.

Other nations, including the Philippines, Russia and China, are among their competitors. India's software exports are expected to reach $9.5 billion in 2001-02 (April-March) from an estimated $6.4 billion in the current financial year. NASSCOM has set a target of $50 billion of exports by 2008.

The country's annual demand for information technology workers, meanwhile, is expected to zoom to 340,000 by 2007 from 90,000 this year, according to NASSCOM.

Social concerns weigh heavily on India as it positions itself for Internet-driven growth founded on the basis of strong higher education over decades.

Digital divide

Arun Netravalli, the Indian-born president of Bell Laboratories, the research arm of telecoms equipment maker Lucent Technologies said in his keynote address at the conference that there were about 1,000 chief executives of Indian origin in the United States.

He said that 30 per cent of all Internet software in the world was being written by Indians.

Industry experts say this contrasts with the fact that more than 35 per cent of India's one-billion-strong population still cannot read and write, and Internet connections are estimated at just over two million.

Engineering education is largely under government control, and a handful of private education companies are fast turning out workers. But quality is a key concern.

"I think it is time we realised that education cannot be someone else's baby," Vandrevala said, calling for industry initiatives.

Indian firms were once accused of body-shopping engineers or running sweat shops, but have increasingly switched to organised management methods to streamline, woo and retain their valuable workers.

Vandrevala said NASSCOM planned to set up an ethics committee to help standardise practices on working conditions and ethics as small firms grow in size and number.

There is concern among political leaders over the Digital Divide because the rise of high-technology jobs will coincide with the decline or loss of old jobs.

Information Technology Minister Pramod Mahajan said older workers needed to be retrained to adapt to new technologies.

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