Mahajan worries about IT scrips boom

BANGALORE: Information technology minister Pramod Mahajan has said that, he was concerned about the way stockmarkets were reacting to infotech stocks.

"To me, it appears crazy that companies with annual sales of around Rs. 300 crore have a market capitalisation of over $41 billion," he said, while inaugurating a conference on e-commerce organized by the Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Ficci). "The most important point for me is whether such a boom can be sustained. Or will the market crash one morning and we will have to start from the beginning," he said. The technology savvy

Nasdaq, alongwith Indian stocks of Infosys and Satyam Infoway, have notched smart gains to record ends over the past weekm Mahajan added.

The minister also said the Information Technology (IT) bill would become law by May, with Parliament taking it up during the budget session. "The Parliamentary sub-committee to which the bill has been referred is examining the bill and is almost halfway through it," he said. He also assured the industry that genuine demands would be incorporated in the bill as amendments. "We are open to recommendations by the industry towards the IT Bill," he said. On issues related to infrastructure, Mahajan said besides improving the telecom and Internet infrastructure, the government would also look at non-IT areas like roads, airports, and ports to facilitate e-commerce.

"The government would need to work on non-IT infrastructure areas to ensure the speedy supply of goods ordered on the Net," he said. The minister said e-commerce offers Indian companies the advantages of speed, access to the globalmarket, transparency and removal of middlemen. "More and more emphasis on e-commerce will remove the chance for black money," he said. Mahajan also

said there was a digital divide among the people of India and the government was committed to remedying this problem.