Indian challengers sneak up on Bangalore

A host of rival Indian cities line up incentives to woo tech investors.

The story "Indian challengers sneak up on Bangalore" published November 7, 2005 at 3:12 AM is no longer available on CNET News.

Content from Reuters expires after 30 days.

[hh5]

IT land grab?

I am a techie living in Bangalore. I can tell you that the IT companies in Bangalore have become insreasingly arrogant. While the infrastruture in Bangalore is terrible and a lot needs to be done to make the life better for city's residents, the constant complainsts and demands by the IT industry are increasingly being seen by many as elitist and self-serving. The IT industry is on a 10 year "tax holiday"!! The payroll taxes actually go to the Central government of India and not to the state government. Other business sectors such as manufacturing and service industries pay their fair share of local taxes. Given these conditions, the local IT industry refused to pay a small cess on their products and services which could have been used to improve local infrastructure. Many even threatened to leave Bangalore if the cess was levied. Many of the infrastructure improvement projects are running at snails pace. Some due to lack of funds and others due to corruption and ineptness of the local and state government agencies.

Local IT giant Infosys has been accused of influencing and pressuring the state politicians and bureaucrats to acqire large tracts of land at concessional rates. Never mind the fact that this is a financially very successful company with deep pockets that can afford to buy land on their own at true market prices. The poor farmers from whom the land is often acquired are paid below the market rates when the goverment steps in to acquire the land for the likes of Infosys.

Another area where the IT comapnies in Bangalore have failed is in employing the local residents in fair proportion. Even entry level job seekers often feel like they are entering national level telent searches even for jobs that have fairly basic requirements.

These issues have given ammunition to some politicians and regional chauvinists and extremists looking to exploit the situation and stir up problems.

It will be interesting to see how things turn out for both the state government and the IT industry in the near future.

- HH