Mumbai: A majority of IT companies in the country has urged the government to create better infrastructure to spur domestic demand and provide incentives to the slowdown-hit IT exports sector, a survey released Wednesday said.

According to the survey, conducted by IT magazine Dataquest, most chief executives of the companies focussed on the domestic market said: "The government should deploy IT in all areas of governance to boost domestic demand."

Two-thirds of the top executives surveyed said the most important task before the new government was to create better infrastructure.

They further asked the government to focus on enhancing citizen services, security and inter-governmental functions.

The chief executives of the export-oriented companies sought extension of the Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) scheme and other incentives for exports.

Under the STPI scheme, introduced a decade ago, IT and IT enabled services (ITeS) firms are exempted from paying taxes on their profit from export of software and services. The 10-year scheme was extended by a year to fiscal 2009 for its multiplier effect on the burgeoning IT industry.

"The message is loud and clear. The IT chief executives feel creating better infrastructure is most critical to the growth of the economy," said Pradeep Gupta, chairman of CyberMedia, which owns Dataquest.

The industry leaders also sought rationalisation of duty incentives, which according to them will help the domestic IT market grow at a higher pace.

They further called for measures to boost local manufacturing and legislation to tackle cyber crime and cyber terrorism, the survey said.

Top executives from 22 leading IT companies, including Aptech, Cisco, Cognizant, Exl Services, Infosys, Microsoft India and Nucleus Software, participated in the survey.

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