Indian Government to spend 368 billion rupees on IT in 2013, says Gartner

The Government of India (GoI) will spend 368 billion rupees on IT products and services in 2013, an increase of 10.5 percent over 2012 revenue of 333 billion rupees, according to Gartner, Inc. This forecast includes spending by government organizations on internal IT (including personnel), hardware, software, external IT services and telecommunications.

Telecommunications, which includes telecommunications and networking equipment and services, will remain the largest overall spending category throughout the forecast period within the government sector. It is expected to grow 6.8 percent in 2013 to reach 118 billion rupees in 2013, up from 111 billion in 2012 – most of this growth will be in enterprise network equipment. Software is achieving the highest growth rate amongst the top level IT spending categories – forecast to be 18 percent in 2013, led by investments in desktop software and infrastructure software.

The IT industry is expected to indirectly benefit from government projects such as the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), which will create an online database .