Response to Dr. Roy Re. Software Exports

["Raju Agarwal" <krantikari@hotmail.com>]

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Please help make the Manifesto better, or accept it, and propagate it!
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Dr. Roy,

Let's start with a few basic questions.

If an Indian software company, announces that its revenues for a given
period were, for example, $100 million, 98% of which were exports.  And
that
these figures have been "independently verified" by the company's
financial
auditors.  Would you accept the $98 million figure as a valid basis of
measurement for that company's exports for the given period?

Likewise, when Reliance announces that its chemical exports are X, or
when
Ford (India) announces it exported Y worth of vehicles, would you accept

those figures?

The empirical evidence, such as:
- construction of IT parks in software cities such as Bangalore,
Hyderabad,
etc,
- the high visibility of Indian programmers working in US companies
- high profile US companies announcing major investments and/or
expansion of
their India software development centers.

suggest that the software export phenomenon is for real and will have a
major impact on the Indian economy, if it can be sustained.  "Whether
the
actual software export figures is X or Y?" is not as important a
question as
"how can we sustain or even accelerate India's software export growth
rate?".  Focusing the discussion on the latter, would, I feel, be a more

constructive use of your time with respect to improving the Indian
economy -
rather than quibbling about the numbers.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is the National Debate on System Reform.       debate@indiapolicy.org
Rules, Procedures, Archives:            http://www.indiapolicy.org/debate/
-------------------------------------------------------------------------