IT ministry launches web portal for BPO promotion scheme

Aiming to drive higher participation in the India business process outsourcing promotion scheme (IBPS), the Ministry of Electronics and IT today launched a dedicated web portal for the scheme.

Launched under the Digital India programme of the government, the IBPS, with an outlay of Rs 493 crore, aims to create employment opportunities and promotion of BPO operations across the country to secure balanced regional growth of IT/ITES industry in India.

“Dedicated Web Portal ibps.stpi.in is being launched today which is one stop web portal to know bidding details, status, news, alerts and other related information regarding India BPO Promotion Scheme (IBPS),” said MeitY in a statement on Monday.

The portal was launched by IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad at a networking workshop for the promotion of the BPO scheme.

“The web portal also provides special login for bidders to raise disbursement requests related to capital support, special incentives and to furnish Quarterly Performance Report etc,” it added.

The scheme provides capital support along with special incentives upto Rs 1 lakh/seat, and the initial plan is to support about 48,300 seats across States and union territories based on population percentage as per Census 2011, excluding metro cities along with their urban agglomeration viz. Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Mumbai, NCR and Pune and States of North East Region.

The scheme was launched last year but struggled to find takers, with only about one fourth of the seats on offer finding bidders until July.

However, the Ministry said it has so far received 83 online bids for about 15,000 BPO/ITES seats in two rounds of bidding for IBPS, while in-principle approval has been issued for a total of 9,020 BPO/ITES seats.

The third round of bidding opened on Monday, and the ministry said it received 22 online bids in the second round of bidding for more than 3,000 seats, which are under technical and financial evaluation by STPI.