Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh may have beaten Maharashtra in cornering significant chunks of the information technology sector pie, but Maharashtra Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde is unwilling to concede it.

Addressing a delegation of over 1,000 delegates, including representatives from the United Kingdom, the United States and Malaysia, Shinde declared that Maharashtra remains 'on top' of the IT sector.

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"Maharashtra supports the highest number of IT parks compared to other states. IT industry does not thrive only in one city here. Besides Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Thane and Pune, IT parks in Nagpur, Aurangabad and Nashik have also attracted substantial investments in IT," Shinde said.

Compared to Karnataka Chief Minster S M Krishna or Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, Maharashtra's chief ministers have maintained a fairly low profile among the IT industry.

But Nasscom's annual event held in Mumbai is something that the state's chief minister has come to understand the importance of.

Shinde, who was on his way to New Delhi to meet with the Congress high command, took time to spell out Maharashtra's IT policy for the audience.

"We have a very proactive, pro-industry IT policy in place. The recently announced policy lays special emphasis on the software industry, is very liberal and open-ended and encourages entrepreneurship," said Shinde.

In the last two years, Pune has emerged as a major spot for Indian IT giants. Companies like Infosys, Wipro, Mastek and Tata Consultancy Services have set up huge development centres in Pune.

Recently, Infosys took an additional 110 acres to expand its centre at the Hingewadi IT Park Pune; Wipro took up another 50 acres, while Patni Computer Services has taken up 25 acres at Airoli in Navi Mumbai.

The export of IT software and services from Maharashtra has been growing at 20 per cent in the last two years.

"We have to further enhance the rate of growth in this sector. We are receiving encouraging response to the policy of private sector participation in creating IT parks," says Shinde.

The state government has already approved 46 such parks in the private sector. Two million square feet of built-up area is already occupied by IT units in these private IT parks and in the next few years, additional 10 million square feet is expected to be made available to IT units.

E-governance is another segment where Shinde says Maharashtra scores over Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.

"For good governance in the state, IT is being used as a facilitating tool. The Maharashtra government bagged four awards from the central government for successful implementation of projects in e-governance, leaving Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh way behind," says Shinde.

For much of his speech, Shinde touted Maharashtra's virtues, but he also addressed the issue of the digital divide.

Only a fraction of India's 1 billion population uses IT. Bringing the benefits of computing to a larger section of the audience is one of the biggest challenges today.

"We must commit ourselves to take IT to the masses. Unless we do this, we many not be able to bridge the digital divide and make IT as the means of mass application for generating employment and creating wealth. I hope members of Nasscom will focus their attention on tapping the vast opportunities available for growth in our domestic market," Shinde said.