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Punjab moots Rs 2.5 billion software park

The STP will be spread over 40 acres and involve investment of the Rs 2.5 billion over the next five years. It will be part of the information technology park in the Mohali industrial area.

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A memorandum of understanding to this effect was signed in Chandigarh between PSEDPC Managing Director Rakesh Singh and Mahindra and Mahindra Senior General Manager Dinesh Tandon.

An Indian Institute of Information Technology will also be housed in the park, known as Softop, with hi-tech infrastructure amenities like high-speed data communications and centralised computing facilities.

Addressing a gathering, Singh said the establishment of, IIIT, engineering colleges by leading IT companies and 100 per cent IT literacy by 2005 would be the key concerns for the state government in its human resource development programmes.

Inviting IT entrepreneurs to set up units at the park, Singh said the facility would provide many advantages like special package for fiscal incentives, automatic approval from pollution control board, assured power, permission to operate from residential areas and venture funds for small and medium enterprises.

Singh said objectives of the Softop includes development to cater to a wide spectrum of IT, software and high-tech companies so as to provide an incubation facility for software and IT companies starting their operations in India besides generating skilled manpower at the site.

A KU-band satellite earth station is already operational at Mohali, which has been set up through the Software Technology Parks of India, a society promoted by the Department of Electronics of central government.

CII Chairman (northern region) Sunil Kant Munjal welcomed the Softop initiative but said there is need for the Punjab government to speedily allot land to software developers.

He urged the state to come out with a very brief and cogent IT policy and market it aggressively within and outside the country.

UNI

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