What is the IT initiative you are spearheading in partnership with the British Council in India?
I have chaired the All Party Parliamentary British Council group since 2000; in 2005 they sent me to New Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore and I saw universities (inc. IIITs), media and IT companies. It was a month after the PM (Tony Blair) had launched UKIERI and someone inside the British Council suggested I headed up the IT sector of it. In 2007, I led a deputation of 12 computer scientists from the UK universities and we visited Bangalore and Hyderabad; subsequently there have been a series of tie-ups between a variety of different university bodies in India. In December, I shall be repeating the exercise with leading academics from the UK with a specialism in Artificial Intelligence and we shall be visiting Chennai and Hyderabad. Why do you think it is important for India and the UK to work in partnership in the field of Information Technology? All over the business world, at very senior levels, you find Indians especially in COO and CIO positions. It is not just a numbers game, somethi
