Dewang Mehta

He had a dream

"Roti, kapda, makaan aur bandwidth" was Dewang Mehta's war cry
in the 90s as a prescription to India becoming an IT superpower. Perhaps, even
today, more than five years after his sudden and untimely demise in Australia,
and maybe for posterity, Dewang would remain the face of Nasscom and
consequently the Indian software services industry. When he took over Nasscom's
stewardship in 1990 the body had only 72 members, but when he passed away in
2001 it had more than 500 members. Whatever the Indian software industry has
achieved today, by way of a high profile public image globally and various sops
from the government, has been due to Dewang's untiring efforts. In ten years
the man had done for the IT industry what lesser mortals might not have achieved
in 50 years.