NASSCOM shares 2015-16 Budget recommendations with government for SMEs, entrepreneurs

NASSCOM has recently shared its budget recommendations for 2015-16 with the Government in order to leverage the global competencies of the ICT sector and also enable the IT industry to map a sustained growth plan. The recommendation highlight necessary aspects that can promote a healthy growth oriented business environment for existing players, innovation driven startups and SMEs.

The emergence of a rapidly growing ecosystem for innovation, driven by young, tech savvy entrepreneurs is a complement to the existing global reach of the industry. The SMEs and technology start-ups need access to funds, incentives to support operations and a simplified compliance framework. On the other hand, large enterprises require stable policies and predictable regulations to continue its global journey.

While talking about the recommendations, R. Chandrashekhar, President, NASSCOM, said, “The Government has been progressive and has committed to adopt technology for governance. With enabling policies and speedy implementation, we can surely realize the Digital India vision. The success of the flagship initiatives of the government - Digital India and Make in India not only offer tremendous opportunities for the innovation driven technology Industry, but its success also hinges on the sustainability and continued growth of the technology driven sector. Hence, factors that can potentially restrict growth and innovation needs to be addressed.”

Some of the salient recommendations by NASSCOM includes - addressing regulatory and tax challenges for technology startups and SMEs, difficulties in access to funding for low asset based firms, investor difficulties related to regulations and taxations discouraging investors, ambiguous Software product taxation and implementation issues adding to burden, incentives for technology start-ups and SMEs, extend provisions on deduction for employment and skill development, suggestions for new provisions like offsetting manpower training cost, deferred tax credits for startups and many others.

The prevailing conditions and prerequisites for participating in Government programs are onerous, and not all past experiences have been favourable. Further, SMEs face stiff barriers in the eligibility criteria related to past experience which need to be revisited. There are several long pending issues that require clarifications to minimise disputes. The industry will leverage the recently constituted High Level Committee for the purpose.