Union Minister of State for Planning V Narayanasamy today assured the IT industry that their concerns over the proposed Direct Taxes Code and lapse of tax concessions would be taken up with the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee.
"You are one of the largest employment providers in the country and the government would come to your support. The tax concessions and DTC are going to be your problem. Therefore, we would like to ensure that whatever be the problem, I will take it to the Prime Minister and Finance Minister," he said.
Narayanasamy, who looks after IT in the Union Planning Commission was speaking to reporters after inaugurating a two-day conference Connect 2010, organised by industry body Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) here.
The DTC bill, which was tabled in Parliament last month, proposed that the Special Economic Zones notified on or before March 31, 2012, will get income tax benefits.
And units in SEZs that commence commercial operations by March 2014 shall be allowed profit-linked deductions permitted under the Income Tax Act 1961.
"As a person looking after the IT sector in the Planning commission, I will be your ambassador in protecting the interests of the IT industry..I told the Prime Minister that the IT industry is one of the growing industries in India and should not suffer (by DTC and Tax concession issues)," he said.
Urging Indian IT industry to be a pioneer in the hardware industry, he said a blueprint on it is formulated by the Ajay Chaudhry committee, which has submitted its report. "The government is yet to finalise the recommendations and it will be implemented based on that," Narayanasamy said.
He said India would import hardware components worth $419 billion in the next five years.
The minister suggested that the industry should focus on R&D and as this area is of major concern. "You also need to invest in R&D, with the investments we can also upgrade our technology," he said.