IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad Thursday held an extensive consultation with IT honchos and sought the industry's active involvement in social initiatives, ahead of Prime Minister's townhall with technology professionals slated for October 24.
The IT minister -- who chaired a two-hour meeting with IT industry stalwarts on Thursday -- said Prime Minister Narendra Modi will hold a town hall in Delhi on October 24 with tech professionals across the country to "enthuse and inspire them" to make India's digital story, one of social inclusion.
Emerging from the meeting with IT industry leaders, Prasad said companies in technology and electronics domain have vowed to come together for "social action", and ideas thrown up during the brainstorming session include volunteering for social cause, and a co-ordinated CSR (corporate social responsibility) outreach on a common platform.
"On October 24, the PM will hold a town hall event in Delhi, where there will be thousands of IT professionals...he will also speak to CEOs and IT professionals in over a dozen locations to enthuse and inspire them to make India's digital story, one of social inclusion," the minister said.
Prasad later tweeted: "PM will launch a digital platform to share best practices, convergence of CSR initiatives and engagement of volunteers from IT companies who are keen on contributing for development works and act as agents of change."
Thursday's meeting was attended by representatives of large technology companies, including Google and Samsung, as well as apex industry bodies like Nasscom and Indian Cellular Association (ICA).
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Lauding the strong performance of the Indian IT industry, the minister noted that technology companies had posted USD 168 billion in revenue and USD 127 billion in exports. He said that time has now come for the industry to work with "co-ordination and compassion" for the welfare of the society.
"There is a larger need to bring CSR into a common pool for sharing best practices. The entire industry, IT and electronics, is committed to this and many ideas were discussed at the meeting" he said.
Some of the ideas that were discussed at the meeting include companies allowing sabbatical to their employees for corporate social volunteering, undertaking social initiatives in backward and laggard districts and sharing of industry best practices on a common platform.
The meeting was attended by Debjani Ghosh (Nasscom President), Rajan Anandan (Google Vice President - South East Asia and India), TV Mohandas Pai (IT industry veteran), BVR Mohan Reddy (Cyient Executive Chairman), and Pankaj Mohindroo (Indian Cellular Association, National President) among others.
"Every single IT company is doing a lot in the CSR space, there will now be a convergence point...We have agreed that we will set up a process and indicators which can measure the impact through quarterly reports and will turn this into sustainable movement, with real impact," Ghosh said.
Pai said that IT industry spends about Rs 5,000 crore annually on CSR activities, and added that the impact of that is not fully known.
"When everything comes on one single platform, you will see what is happening, its leverage is fantastic. Another aspect will be focussing our initiatives towards aspirational districts of India," Pai added.
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