India will have largest working population: Nilekani

Bangalore, Jul 25: India will have the largest working population in the world during the next decade and will reap the 'demographic dividend' like no other country did in the past, Infosys Technologies Co-Chairman Nandan M Nilekani said today.

Delivering the key-note address at the 2nd International Conference on 'Management of Globally Distributed Work (GDW)' organised by Indian Institute of Management-Bangalore here, he said that GDW had become a real phenomenon and was no more an academic exercise. It was not static but a dynamic idea and helped India to think ahead.

"Infosys, a flat world company, is an example of the country embracing the GDW and it has showed that how it could be used to advantage of a nation. In GDW the system and technology could be utilised to optimal level. Demographic Dividend and technological advancement will put India in fast lane of development," he said.

Availability of cheaper Bandwidth, following the telecom revolution and advancement in space technology, had led to change trends in India and this had resulted in the country becoming a major destination for IT, BPO and KPO industry.

"Bandwidth, computing and knowledge power and cost advantage has driven India in the recent times. Emerging economies like India, China and South East Asian countries have cornered 51 per cent of global Gross Domestic Product and IT has been the main driver in this economic surge," he added.

India produced 3.5 lakh engineering graduates per annum, compared to 70,000 in United States. This figure was expected to reach two million by 2010. It had attracted world's attention for its knowledge wealth. However, it was disturbing that the quality of the technical graduates was not uniform.

"We need to achieve a higher bench mark in quality of technical education to produce high quality human capital. We have to create facilities to provide better education and training. To help institutions the IT industry as a whole is working with AICTE and top Universities," he added.

UNI