Indian IT industry a target for militants

India's multi-billion-dollar IT software industry is a target for attacks by militant groups, a top home ministry official warned Wednesday.

"We are world leaders in software," Gopal Pillai, India's home secretary told a conference on the "Challenge of Terrorism to India's Infrastructure and Economy" in New Delhi.

"The software industry is high on the threat list and all companies in India are now realising this and they are taking their own measures to see how best they can provide security," he said. government was helping IT firms meet the security challenge, he added. At the end of July, 101 federal troops began guarding the headquarters of IT leader Infosys in the southern city of Bangalore.

The group agreed to pay around 25.6 million rupees (S$762,880) a year, according to reports.

The cities of Bangalore and Hyderabad, another IT hub, have been targeted with bombings in the past. At least two people were killed and seven injured last July when Bangalore was rocked by seven explosions.

And in 2007, 43 people were killed in twin attacks on an outdoor auditorium and an famous eatery in Hyderabad.

India has been on alert since last November's Mumbai attacks in which 166 people were killed when 10 gunmen targeted a string of locations in the country's financial and entertainment capital.

According to the National Association of Software and Service Companies, or Nasscom, India's top outsourcing body, the sector's export revenues are expected to be 50 billion dollars this financial year to March 2009.