The Hindu Business Line : Outsourcing: British team to recommend more Indian cos

AFTER concluding the seventh meeting of the Indo-UK Round Table on Sunday, the British delegation has decided to recommend to its Government the propagation of the activities of Indian companies in the UK.

This was announced by Lord Swraj Paul, co-Chairman of the Indo-UK Round Table at a press conference on Monday. According to Lord Paul, the British delegates expressed concern over the rising number of jobs being outsourced by the British companies from India.

He, however, clarified that the British Government had categorically stated that it would not interfere in the matter as it was a natural outcome of the globalisation of economies.

"There will always be concern among trade unions, governments and individuals in the UK because a job when it is outsourced from another country means that the job opportunity is lost in the UK," Lord Paul said.

In this context, he said that more Indian companies are increasing their operations in the UK.

According to him, in the last three years, 465 companies have made investments in the UK.

The British delegation will request its Government to propagate this matter. It will also ask its Government to highlight the number of job opportunities created by Indian companies in the UK.

"In the last few years, there has been a phenomenal increase in the number of Indian companies operating from the UK. They have made huge investments and also created jobs. This must be highlighted," he said.

Talking about job outsourcing, Lord Paul said the call centres, coming up all over India, were the most inferior example.

"Indians can do more. We must upgrade our universities further so that more sophisticated solutions are outsourced from India," he said.

From the Indian side, the Indo-UK Round Table, which was created in 2000, is chaired by Mr K.C. Pant, the Deputy Chairman of Planning Commission. It meets twice a year.

The round table is a forum for "high-level civil society dialogue" between representatives of the two countries on "issues of mutual interest."

It sends suggestions and recommendations to their respective prime ministers after every meeting.

Members of both the sides were concerned about the poor airline connectivity between India and the UK.

They felt this was a major obstacle in the way of increasing tourism, bilateral co-operation and trade between the two countries.

"We would ask both the governments to sit down and work out ways for increasing the number of flights. Cheaper flights need to be introduced as it would lead to more interaction among people of the two countries," he said.

According to Lord Paul, representatives of both the countries had intensive discussions on the menace of global terrorism.

Both sides held more or less same views on the issue. "There was unanimity that there could not be any equivalence between terrorism and counter terrorism measures undertaken by democratic States. It was felt that the fight against terrorism had to be a broad-based approach to be effective."