Mitra, who also holds a Cabinet rank, was speaking during the inaugural function of the three-day Express Technology Sabha in Kolkata.

The 35th edition of the event was inaugurated by Mitra, Srikanth R P, Editor, Express Computer, The Indian Express Group, Akash Saxenaa,Vice President and Head of enterprise business, Samsung Electronics.

The other key speakers included Monojit Datta, Customer Engineer, Infrastructure Modernisation, Google Cloud, Rohan Kumar Pandey, Senior Manager, Business development, Schneider Electric, and Praveen Kulkarni, Country Manager, Opentext Rah Infotech.

Mitra, a former finance, industry and IT minister in the state, said the West Bengal government under the leadership of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, has achieved success in utilising information technology for superior governance.

“Approximately 2,53,000 people are direct employees in the IT industry in Bengal,” said Mitra.

“In 2010, (IT-related) exports from the state were around Rs 8,500 crore and in 2022-23, we recorded such exports to the value of Rs 33,000 crore,”
he added.

Babul Supriyo, Cabinet Minister for Information Technology and Electronics, said, “The state government aspires to see Bengal transform into the next IT hub of the country. Kolkata has great manpower and skilled people. There is no reason why we shouldn’t convert it into the next IT hub,” said Supriyo.