IT industry body National Association of Software & Services Companies hinted on Tuesday at the possibility of lowering the Indian IT-ITeS growth forecast of 21-24 per cent for 2008-09 following the global meltdown.
"There would be some resetting of expectations", president of Nasscom, Som Mittal, said on the sidelines of 'TiE Entrepreneurial Summit 2008 (TES 2008)' in Bangalore.
"But it's all for the short-term. We believe that it could be 4-6 quarters of uncertainty that will prevail. I see a lot more clarity coming from the first quarter (April-June 2009)", he said.
On revisiting the growth forecast, Mittal said: "We are getting there; we are picking up information and analysing it.
First half (of 2008-09) has been reasonably good. We had a 24 per cent growth in the first six months. Second half should be slower than the first half. That's very clear".
He indicated that the Nasscom would come out with a clear view vis-a-vis the growth forecast in Junuary first week, saying 'it may happen before the quarterly results start coming out'.
"We are getting mixed signals. There are some areas where growth is continuing because customers are under pressure. But very clearly decision-making is slowing at this point in time", he said.
Mittal said wages in the IT-ITeS sector are likely to moderate next year.
He also said net additions (of employees in the IT-ITeS sector) in 2008-09 would be significantly lower than the previous year.