India Reassures On Y2K After U.S. Travel Advisory

Updated 2:36 PM ET September 15, 1999

By Narayanan Madhavan

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India defended the readiness of its key economic sectors for the Year 2000 (Y2K) computer problem Wednesday after the United States warned travelers that they could face difficulties.

There are about 110 days left before the year 2000, but officials said the final touches on India's Y2K readiness should be completed by the end of October. Experts at a Y2K seminar identified the power, petroleum, aviation, railways and telecommunications sectors among the well prepared, but doubts lingered on ports and non-critical small enterprises.

"Aviation, as far as I'm concerned is Y2K-compliant, except for two radars which will be compliant next month," said Ravindra Gupta, secretary of the department of electronics.

The United States advised Americans Tuesday that they could experience Y2K bug-related difficulties travelling in Brazil, China, India and Russia. It said India appeared to be generally prepared, particularly in telecommunications, banking and finance.

"The largest question is the readiness of the electric power sector and the ocean ports, parts of which have been slow to address the Y2K issue," it said in a travel advisory update.

Gupta, a member of a government Y2K action force, said any concern over aviation would be misplaced.

"When you are travelling from the U.S., you are crossing over several states. There may be a problem somewhere else. I do not see a cause for concern in Indian skies," he said.

Gupta said global consultants Gartner Group had placed India's key sectors at four on a scale of five in preparedness, indicating a high degree of compliance.

"I think that should give you some comfort," he said.

The Y2K bug refers to a problem that might occur in older computers which denote years by their last two digits. The risk is that the year 2000 may be read as 1900, which could lead to a loss of valuable data and hurt key operations when 1999 changes to 2000.

Gupta said 60 percent of India's power utilities were still using Y2K problem-free technologies dating back before 1985. Of the rest, which involve 55 plants, 86 percent were already prepared to face the Y2K challenge.

"We expect the remaining 14 percent to be compliant, safely, by the end of October," he said. "Today I feel reasonably confident that power will be compliant by the end of October."

The official said he expected ports to be "by and large" ready within the same timeframe, but some compliance work might overshoot to November.

Dewang Mehta, president of the National Association of Software and Service Companies and a member of the action force, said the government needed to address ports.

He also identified small and medium enterprises as being less aware of the Y2K challenge. "This is something we want to push in the next 100 days," he said.

Gupta told reporters that India had as many as 500,000 small and medium enterprises, and it was difficult to monitor each of them. However, he argued that there was no critical danger because they usually did not function in a networked environment.

In a compliance status presentation at the end of August, Mehta said the financial sector was 92 percent compliant, while telecommunications and petroleum were both 90 percent ready

-- Ray (ray@totacc.com), September 15, 1999