Welcoming the Centre’s Make In India campaign, Karnataka IT&BT Minister S R Patil said that the state government has re-engineered its policies to make the state a IT and electronics hub.
“Our new ESDM policy aims at capturing at least 1/5th of the $400 billion electronic market. The Karnataka i-4 policy aims at further boosting the growth of IT, particularly in other cities and towns of the state,” he while speaking at the Bangalore ITE.Biz - CeBIT India, a 3-day international showcase of the IT and electronics industries.
Patil said the IT industry is moving beyond just software services to product engineering, research and development and start-up culture. “These dramatic changes are visible in the areas of telecom, consumer electronics, aerospace, automotives, healthcare and retailing,” he said.
The minister said the state government has pioneered changes in the IT sector to provide a better model for the Digital India. “Prime Minister Narendra Modi has unveiled a ‘Digital India’ programme. But the idea for Digital India originates from Karnataka,” he said.
Besides offering incentives and concessions in the early days of this millennium to attract investments in the IT-BT sectors, the state offers sales tax exemption, concessional power tariff and exemption from stamp duty,“We continue to offer such incentives and concessions with the objective of attracting IT investments in other cities and towns of the state,” he said.
“For the first time, the Department of IT, BT and S&T has been empowered to act as a single window clearance agency for giving clearance to IT projects, from handshake to inauguration of companies. I am sure these initiatives will take the state to much greater heights in the IT sphere,” he said,
“During the global recession of 2008-10, the growth rate of the IT sector slumped to 11-12 per cent. But, state continued to thrive at 17-18 per cent with solid support from the state government,” he claimed.