By IANS,
Gandhinagar : Sam Pitroda, chairman of the Knowledge Commission and advisor to the prime minister, said here Thursday that creating an international financial centre was not all about building real estate but required attention to numerous other details.
Chairing a session at the fifth Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit on the state’s most ambitious project, Gujarat International Finance Tech City (GIFT), Pitroda said that three most essential pre-requisites for it were speed, fibre network and broadband connectivity. “If you can’t pay attention to these factors, an international centre cannot come up,” he added.
Pitroda pointed out that for any international finance centre, the main factor is inclusive growth. “There are many mobile users but a fair measure of them were not bankable. The need is not big buildings but soft infrastructure. Hundreds of gigabytes of bandwidth all over India is needed for any GIFT city type project,” he added.
He said that the government of India was going in for providing broadband connectivity to 250,000 village panchayats in the country. “Besides, the Unique Identity (UID) programme is also being implemented. All this will go to increase the bankability of the common man and lead to inclusive growth,” he added.
Pitroda also pointed out that the 2G spectrum would not have attracted attention without the 3G spectrum allocation being made. “There is urgent need for educating the people about financial services if projects like the GIFT city are to succeed. If this is not done, it will just remain a commercial centre which Ahmedabad already is,” he added.