Participating in the Information Technology(IT) Session of the Progressive Punjab Summit, Adesh Pratap Singh Kairon, IT Minister Punjab, satiating the queries of the participants informed that Govt. Of Punjab is working with the mission to create investor friendly, efficient, conducive and an enabling ecosystem for investment in the field of IT & Electronic Hardware so that Punjab emerges as the destination for IT. He informed that Mohali and Amritsar are being promoted as key IT destinations. Talking of Mohali he said “everything is in line”, 1700 acres are available for development in the IT City, 40 acres of land has been earmarked for electronics hardware, Electronics Township has been developed in 289 acres and facilities are available for Centre for Development of Advanced Computing(C-DAC). Besides, there is Plug and Play infrastructure at Quark City and State of Art incubation Center at Mohali. Land has been acquired in Amritsar and the proposed project will take off soon, he added. He also informed that necessary spadework would also be undertaken to develop Ludhiana and Jalandhar as IT destinations. He informed that IT Policy is well in place but doors are not shut to suggestions and changes can be incorporated in it as and when the need be after deliberations with the stakeholders.
A R Talwar, Principal Secretary IT, Punjab giving details of the Package of incentives in IT Policy of Punjab informed that it offers 80% retention in VAT & CST for 10 years upto 80% of Fixed Capital Investment, 100% Exemption from electricity duty for 10 years , 100% Exemption from stamp duty on purchase/lease of land, , 100% Exemption from Property Tax for 10 years, Exemption of clearances from Pollution Control Board and inspection under various labour laws, Preferential Market Access(PMA) to Electronics Hardware Manufacturing units in line with GOI policy and Special incentive package for electronic system design manufacturing cluster for semi conductor Wafer Fab.Mr. Biren Ghose, Country Head, Technicolour, BV Naidu Chairman & MD Sagitaur Group of Companies, Onkar Rai Director General, Software Technology Park of India, Pankaj Mohindroo, National President, Indian Cellular Association, Sanjeev Gupta MD , Corporate Affairs Accenture, Sanjeev Keskar MD, Sales, PMC Sierra and Vishal Dhar, Co-founder & President- Marketing iYogi constituted the panelists for the Session and put forth their views on various aspects of IT sector, its needs, challenges, emerging trends and future possibilities.It emerged from the 2 hour long Session that timely initiative coupled with a lot of incentives offered by Government of Punjab can reap good harvest but Govt of Punjab needs to showcase its offers and opportunities to IT giants worldwide and prove its mettle.