The inaugural session showcased the NASSCOM Foundation (NF) film.  Mr. Saurabh Sirvastava – Chairman - NASSCOM Foundation, talked about NF activities and the promise of I.T. and its track record. How IT can be harnessed to improve the quality of life for large numbers of humans. 

Following that, Mr. Som Mittal- The NASSCOM President shared his views on the need for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and how CSR should now be the integral part of any corporate and must be viewed as a responsibility to the society at large and especially the underserved. He also made a key point of introducing the NF track in the Main Session along with NASSCOM next year.

Book Release of the Catalyzing Change

The book “Indian IT / ITES Industry: Impacting the Economy and Society” was released by Mr. Saurabh Srivastava along with Ambassador  Walter Fust – Director General, Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, Mr. Jacques Attali – President ,Planet Finance  Mr. Jerry Rao and Mr. Som Mittal.
 
This was followed by an overview of the book  by Mr.Roopen Roy – Head and M.D Deloitte thereafter a presentation on the methodology of the research by Ms. Charu Sehgal from Deloitte.

Ambassador Walter Fust also addressed a key note on ICT for development. He emphasized on the tremendous opportunities that ICT provides to access knowledge. He also talked about public private partnerships as a way ahead. He stressed on multistakeholder partnership to achieve development goals. He citied a lot of examples as proof points and in conclusion urged stakeholders to bring all resources to achieve a balanced economic growth to all.

Mr. Jerry Rao in his introduction mentioned NF being the magnet to pull IT companies to align their CSR efforts. In his keynote, Mr. Jacques Attali, stressed on the ability of  IT to bridge the economic gap and thus helping in poverty reduction.

Building Capacities for Rural Employability

The session on Building Skills for Rural Employability & Entrepreneurship, was chaired by Mr. Laxmi Narayanan- Chairman NASSCOM. This session began with Mr.Harsh Manglik of Accenture, on the need for inclusive growth. He emphasized on the need for vocational training programs for more employment in the rural areas. While he was upbeat about the same, but he did mention the challenges around on scalability. He concluded with focusing on using innovations in ICT to extend the reach that is efficient, consistent and impactful too.

The next speaker Mr. Raju Bhatnagar, Head-Indian Operations, SerWizsol, talked about his success story around the rural BPO which they have focused on and the importance of local languages which is key to such initiatives. This was followed by Mr. Rajendra Pawar, Chairman NIIT, who stressed on the role of ICT for education citing examples of NIIT’s various initiatives on using IT for enhanced learning.

Innovations for Strategic Outreach

The session on Strategic Outreach was chaired by Mr. Kiran Karnik, Former President, NASSCOM. The focus of this session was mainly on Microfinance(MF). The session began with Mr. Jacques Attalli giving an overview of the Microfinance world and the need for innovations in MF for the benefit of the underserved. This was followed by a talk by Mr. Jonathan Weinstein, Global Head Unitus, who talked about using IT as an enabler for innovations in MF.

The next panelists, Mr. Manish Khera, C.E.O, FINO, spoke about MF aiding in poverty reduction. Mr. Luc Francious Salvador stressed on CSR being an important tool to embody ethics and DNA in any organization and thus concluded this session with need for PPP.

This session was summarized by Mr. Samit Ghosh Chief Executive Officer, Ujjivan, by focusing on the need for MF and emphasized MF being a powerful tool for poverty alleviation and improving lives. 

In Conversation

The last and the most interesting session was “In Conversation” with Mr. Ramalinga Raju who talked about his modest background and their need to help the underprivileged.