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Rampant piracy threatens to impede software biz growth in India
Monday, 15 December 2003, 20:30 IST
NEW DELHI: Unchecked software piracy in India may emerge as a major deterrent to the growth of the country's booming technology industry in the years ahead, a global organisation has warned.
India, where 70 percent of software applications are pirated, can dramatically increase the number of jobs and accelerate economic growth by cracking down on software piracy, says the Washington-based Business Software Alliance.
"The high-level of software piracy in India is surely a matter of concern for the government as well as the technology industry," said Robert Holleyman, president and chief executive officer of the Business Software Alliance (BSA).
"We believe that 70 percent of all software applications, which are being used today, are pirated in India. That's a far too high level by any standards and is not conducive for the growth of the tech sector," Holleyman told IANS.
The level of piracy in India is sharply higher when compared with the global piracy rate of 40 percent and 25 percent in the US.
"Such high level of piracy is putting up roadblocks in the way of achieving higher growth in the industry. It needs to come down at the earliest," said Holleyman.
Piracy -- the illegal theft, manufacture, copying and selling of high-tech products -- continues unabated in India even as Asia's third largest economy strives to emerge as a global technology hub.
On the back of a vast pool of English-speaking, tech savvy and cheap manpower, India's IT market has grown from $1.73 billion in 1994-95 to $16.5 billion in 2002-03, accounting for three percent of gross domestic product last year.
The country's software exports totalled $9.5 billion in the fiscal year that ended on March 31, 2003.
The National Association of Software and Service Companies, India's premier IT industry lobby group, says software exports are on track to grow at 26 to 28 percent during the current fiscal year ending March 2004.
The lightning growth of the hi-tech industry in India in recent years has led to a feverish demand for business and consumer software, whether genuine or fake. And software piracy has become a thriving industry, says experts.
According to industry sources, hundreds of thousands of desktop computers in India run on pirated Windows operating systems, resulting in huge revenue losses for the maker of the software Microsoft.
Holleyman of BSA said despite stronger copyright laws in India software counterfeiting is worsening all over the country, making it one of the top Asian countries with highest rate of piracy.
"The laws are there in India but it should be backed with effective enforcement and spreading of awareness among the users at large. People should be made aware of the downside of using pirated software," he said.
"The crackdown on illegal trade of software should be a three-pronged approach - law, enforcement and education.
"We believe that one can change user behaviour by spreading awareness. There is a moral and ethical reason for respecting people's intellectual property rights. The software makers deserve to receive a return on their investments."
According to Holleyman, reducing software piracy could speed the growth of the IT industry and that, in turn, could create more jobs and help the industry earn more revenues.
"The government also stands to benefit by cracking down on software piracy. When people are using a pirated version of a software they are not paying the government the tax revenues it should be receiving," he said.
According to a BSA study, India can create 50,000 more high tech jobs, add $2.1 billion to its economy and boost IT industry's revenue by over $1.6 billion if the country brings down piracy rate to 60 percent by 2006 from 70 percent now.
Source: IANS
Source: IANS
