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Growth rate of 9% quite feasible, says Montek

Kanchana Suggu in Bombay

The Planning Commission has been assigned a rather important task by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee: to see that they bring the growth rate from the present level of 6.5 per cent to 9 per cent.

"I think that is very feasible," said Dr Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Member, Planning commission.

Despite the general perception that the information technology industry is on the downslide and also fears of the US economy slowdown encompassing India, the performance of the IT industry has not been bad at all, Singh said.

"There has been a six-fold increase in software exports since 1994," he said.

He said that the government policy does not look very kindly at the IT industry only because half-a-per cent of the gross domestic product comes from the IT industry, but the fact that this industry is a major foreign exchange earner cannot be ignored.

"The IT industry is expected to contribute $5 billion by 2008. That's a major source of foreign exchange," he said.

Availability of power, adequate growth of human skills, expansion of e-governance are some of the areas India needs to immediately focus on, he said.

"Power is a problem in every state. The state electricity boards are not viable because they are charging rates that are too low to too many people," Singh said.

He said that the only way India can move ahead is if the individual states progress. "The Centre has asked all the state governments to co-operate with infrastructure providers," Singh asserted.

Singh also stressed upon the importance of increasing trained manpower in India. Graduates from IITs and regional engineering colleges have to be tripled, he said while adding that the government has to play a major role in doing this.

The government also has a major role to play in terms of applying benefits of IT in e-governance. Transparency and speed in conducting transactions should be achieved, he said.

Commenting on the government's slogan of bringing IT to the masses, Singh told rediff.com, "The introduction of cyber kiosks could have the same effect in terms of IT for masses like STD phones did 5-6 years ago. It is a very serious issue and we should take every effort."

"In a country like India, where personalised Internet connections is not possible for too many people, a cyber kiosk enables individuals to use the Internet for a short period of time."

"Use of Internet for distance education and expansion of health services is very important. We should have referral systems where a primary health centre could get specialised information from a hospital. These things are not idea spread right now, but the technology makes it possible to do it. In the next 2-3 years, we may see a lot more of it than we see today," Singh said.

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