Thaindian News

Trissur (Kerala), Jan 15 (IANS) The IT park coming up in this Kerala town is expected to provide employment opportunities to 5,000 people, state Revenue Minister K.P. Rajendran said here Thursday, while handing over possession of the land to the IT department.The 42 acres at the Koratty neighbourhood were handed over to Secretary (IT) Ajay Kumar, who said that Infopark Trissur would form a part of the hub and spoke model of development planned with Infopark Kochi acting as the hub.

“With its proximity to the Cochin airport and availability of ready to use power and infrastructure, Infopark Trissur will have a jump start in attracting investors and IT companies,” he said.

Built with an initial investment of over Rs.500 million, the IT park is expected to provide direct employment opportunities to 5,000 IT/ITES professionals within two years.

This comes at a time when Technopark officials are finalising the master plan for the first district level IT park in Kerala, to come up at Kundara near Kollam. Its foundation stone will be laid next month.

In May last year, the state government announced that IT level parks would be developed under private-public partnership model in all 14 districts of Kerala.

In the first phase, IT parks would come up in Kollam, Alappuzha, Thrissur, Kannur and Kasaragod districts.

Currently, IT companies operating in the state are based either at the Technopark campus at the state capital Thiruvananthapuram or in the Infopark campus in Kochi.

Nearly 150 companies are operating in the Technopark. They employ close to 20,000 people, while around 40 companies that employ nearly 8,000 people are in Infopark.

The government would hold 51 percent stake in the district level parks and the rest will be with private and public companies, which would build the necessary infrastructure.