GUWAHATI, May 29 ? Guwahati was today put on the global Information Technology (IT) map with the Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi, inaugurating the firstever international call centre of the NE region here this afternoon. The international call centre is set up by DSS-e Contact Limited in the NEDFi IT park in the heart of the city. The 300desk call centre has already recruited 600 young boys and girls from the north eastern region. Inaugurating the call centre, the Chief Minister termed it a path breaking development in the northeastern region, and announced that the Assam government would soon have an Information Technology policy to revolve State?s development around the opportunities in IT enable sectors.
Addressing the function, Dr P D Shenoy, secretary of the Union Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DONER), said that the northeastern region with its huge pool of literate and ?english-speaking? human resources was better placed than other parts of the country to make long strides in IT enabled service sector in the present service-driven economy. He informed that the Central government which provides average Rs 12,000 crore to the NE region every year in the form of grants and aids, was keen to lure investment to the region in the wake of ?marked? improvement in the law-and-order situation. With this objective in mind, the Centre is organising an investors conclave in Mumbai on May 19 and 20 in collaboration with the Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry where the Chief Ministers of all the NE States will get an opportunity to present the investment potential in their respective States before the investors attending the conclave.
Dr Shenoy informed that the Centre had earmarked Rs 220 crore to set up computerised information centres (CICs) in all the 487 Blocks in the entire northeastern region. The BSNL will be in charge of setting up the computers network in the Block level. Dr Shenoy further said that setting up of the international call centre in Guwahati by DSS e-Contact Limited was a significant step considering the huge pool of human resources suiting the requirement of such IT enabled service available in the NE region. Addressing the inaugural function, the Director of DSS e-Contact, Probin Kumar said that although his company was running such centres in different corners of the country, the team for the Guwahati call centre ?is the best? and has potential to make big leaps in the field given the right opportunity.
Kumar further informed that the call centre had already started operation for its global clients like AT & T raking up about 32,000 US dollars in its bank accounts. He said if the things went in the right direction, the company would set up more such centres in the region within the next two years with a plan to take the total call centre desk numbers in the region to 1000. Earlier, in his inaugural address the Chairman-cum-Managing Director (CMD) of the NEDFi, J P Saikia had a few words of appreciation for the contribution of his predecessor, Dr Jayanta Madhab towards setting up of the international call centre here. Dr Jayanta Madhab said that the international call centre in this remote part of the country speaks volumes of the potential of the largely untapped but talented pool of human resources in the region. He called upon the NEDFi to promote more such ventures in other NE States.