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Monday, Nov 26, 2007
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Land identified for IT parks in three districts

Staff Reporter

Land to be acquired in Kozhikode, Malappuram and Palakkad

Part of policy to decentralise IT development
Kozhikode to be one of the three major IT hubs planned

Kozhikode: The State government has stepped up the process of setting up information technology (IT) parks in the northern districts in tune with its policy to decentralise IT development.

Sreekumar K. Nair, Coordinator (New Projects), Technopark, Thiruvananthapuram, said here on Sunday that an apex company formed by the government to buy land and lease it out to technology partners for the IT parks would acquire property in Kozhikode, Malappuram and Palakkad by December-end or early-January.

Mr. Nair was speaking at a district-level seminar, “Malabar — the next IT destination,” organised by the International Association of Lions Clubs here on Sunday.

He will visit the lands identified in the three districts on Monday. They include a site in the city along the Thondayad bypass, another at Panakkad in Malappuram district and land near the proposed Kannur airport.

Mr. Nair said he would sent recommendations on these lands to the IT department soon. Kozhikode would be one of the three major hubs of IT services planned by the government. The idea was to have a public-private participation (PPP) model. There would be no delay, he said.

Employment

He said that IBS, a Technopark-based company, had come forward to start operations in Kozhikode, promising to employ nearly 3,500 people by 2011. He said that Kerala’s share was pathetic when the country’s domestic and export markets of IT was put together. While both the markets came to Rs. 160-lakh crore, Kerala’s contribution was just Rs. 750 crore. Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad did more than half of the IT business in the country. About 25 per cent of the employees working in IT companies in these cities were Keralites. Kerala had high quality of human resources, physical infrastructure and good Internet connectivity.

Economic board

Earlier, in his message read out at the seminar, E.K. Bharath Bhushan, Joint Secretary and Financial Adviser, IT and Tourism, Union Government, mooted the idea of creating an economic development Board for Malabar, which could work out a roadmap for the future. “Some of the things which I believe could help us to put Malabar on the IT radar are doing things like hosting IT events through Calicut IT Initiative, strong support and promotion of IT park as a flagship and actively use it to attract IT attention to Malabar area, enabling small successful IT stories to be featured in the national and regional press. We also need to support and inspire entrepreneurs,” he said.

New thrust area

Saji Gopinath, Professor, Indian Institute of Management, Kozhikode (IIM-K), said Malabar should target Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO) in rural areas, such as Perambra and Pariyaram. Private players should not hesitate to set up their own company in the area on account of the starting of government-sponsored IT parks. “IT, like tourism, will grow when there are more players,” he said.

Offers

Jayafar Moidu of Trasset, an IT company with headquarters in Hungary, which had identified a site near Kadavu Resorts, near the city, for setting up its services here said the company would try to employ 300 to 500 employees in two to three years time. “We could employ students with a starting salary of Rs.25,000 to Rs.30,000. We would be training the engineering students during their studies,” he said.

A. Pradeep Kumar, MLA; Albert Fekete, chief executive officer, Trasset; P. Zakeer, president, Malabar Chamber of Commerce; and K.T. Ajith, district chairperson of IT, Lions District 324 E5; spoke.

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