Budget 2024: Sitharaman Says Investment In New-Age Digital Technologies To Continue
India’s strength in data and technology is not only creating economic opportunities for all, but also for the country globally.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented the Interim Budget 2024 at the Parliament on Feb. 1. She said that rapid digitalisation has been instrumental for India’s growth, and digital public infrastructure has played a crucial role in the formalisation of the economy.
New-age technologies and data are changing the lives of people and businesses. They are enabling new “economic opportunities and facilitating provision of high-quality services at affordable prices for all, including those at bottom of the pyramid,” she said.
Sitharaman announced that India will continue to invest in digital technologies and ensure that they are available for all. The finance minister said that India’s strength in data and technology is not only creating economic opportunities for all, but also for the country at the global level.
Rs 1-Lakh-Crore Corpus For Research And Innovation
Sitharaman underscored the importance of research and innovation for the growth of the country, highlighting Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s focus on 'Jai Vigyan, Jai Anusandhan' (research along with science). The finance minister announced a corpus of Rs 1 lakh crore for 50-year, interest-free loans, which will encourage the private sector to scale up research and innovation in sunrise domains.
Commenting on the announcement, BenQ India Pvt. managing director Rajeev Singh said, “The budget’s focus on “upskilling initiatives and robust R&D investments will not only broad base innovation and startup culture, but also result in the creation of a tech-savvy workforce. For India to manufacture within its own borders, we will require a culture of continuous innovation, something that can only be achieved through strategic focus on R&D.”
Deep Tech To Strengthen Defence
Sitharaman said that the government will launch a new scheme for strengthening deep tech technologies in defence, which will expedite “atmanirbharta” (self-reliance) for the sector. Technology has a crucial role to play in national security. Innovations in the development and deployment of deep tech in defence, including use of drones (unmanned aerial vehicles and unmanned ground vehicles) for surveillance, robotics and artificial intelligence, can provide an edge to national security and India’s defence strategies.
Private players will be encouraged and impetus will be given to deep tech startups working in the defence sector, the finance minister said.
Nandini Tandon, co-founder and chief people officer of Indusface, said, “The focus on deep tech technologies for defence purposes underscores the importance of self-reliance and innovation in critical sectors.”
Skill India Mission Can Help Address AI Skills Crunch
The finance minister announced that the Skill India Mission has trained 1.4 crore youth, upskilled and reskilled 54 lakh youth, and established 3,000 new Industrial Training Institutes. A large number of new institutions of higher learning, including IITs, IIITs, IIMs and universities, have also been set up. Such higher learning institutions are critical to the development of a skilled future workforce.
“As the demand for tech talent surges, the government’s Skill India Mission has played a pivotal role in stemming the talent gap in the IT industry. With 1.4 crore youth upskilled and reskilled, the announcement of higher learning institutions including IITs and IIMs will help India address the AI skill crunch and bridge the gap effectively,” said Manoj Nair, head of India GDC, Fujitsu India.
Cyber Security In Focus
In the 2024 Interim Budget, the outlay for cybersecurity projects has been doubled from Rs 400 crore last year to Rs 759 crore this year, which highlights the increasing importance of cybersecurity and data protection as the digital threat landscape widens unlike ever before.
“We saw 100% websites getting targeted by sophisticated bots in the last year and they even target public facing internal systems such as HRMS or ERPs as per our latest state of application security report. It's essential that cybersecurity receives the attention and resources it deserves in our national budget and strategic planning," said Tandon.
Hrishikesh Rajpathak, co-founder and chief technology officer at nRoad, said, “There's a pressing need for stronger policies on data mining and usage. As technology evolves, data becomes increasingly valuable, raising concerns about privacy, security and ethical usage. Clear guidelines and regulations are essential to safeguarding corporate enterprise data and ensuring optimum utilisation across industries.”
IT/ITeS Outlay Raised
The government has also increased the allocation to IT/IT-enabled service industries by more than 8% to Rs 130 crore in the 2024 Interim Budget. The amount was revised to Rs 120 crore for 2023-24 from the initial outlay of Rs 150 crore.
Two schemes (NEBPS and IBPS) under IT for jobs pillar have been launched under Digital India Programme to incentivise business process outsourcing/ITES operations across the country.
