Broad components of the much awaited new Information and Communication Technology policy of the state government has been brought out by the IT department of Orissa. A committee of six members is to meet in the first week of September this year to discuss the features which would be incorporated in the new ICT policy. The committee comprises of officials of the State IT Department, Orissa Computer Application Centre (OCAC), the Technical Directorate of the State IT Department and representatives from the IT units and the academia engaged in IT education. The new ICT policy which was to be modeled on the best IT practices of IT friendly states like Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal was set to be finalised by November this year.
Apart from including the best IT practices of states like Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh and positioning Orissa as a favourable destination for IT investments, the new policy would also contain enabling measures for growth of IT SMEs (small and medium enterprises). The state IT department is set to formulate a new ICT policy after a gap of five years. The new policy assumes significance as the state had emerged as one of the attractive destinations for the IT sector. The proposed IT projects were facing delay as the IT majors were going slow on construction work in the aftermath of the global economic meltdown. The state IT department was planning to review the progress of these projects in October this year.
