The Ministry of Communication and Information Technology will soon come out with the final modalities for IT Investment Regions (ITIR) proposed to be set up in Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and Karnataka, a top official said today.

"The Planning Commission has in principle agreed for setting up projects in three states. As per the process we are in consultations with various departments. We are working out modalities. We will be able to come out with the finality in 3-4 months," IT Secretary Chandrasekhar told reporters on the sidelines of eIndia-2010 a three day conclave of IT and IT related activities.

ITIRs are larger than IT SEZs and are specifically notified investment region with minimum area of 40 sq km planned for IT and ITeS and EHM units. The minimum processing area would be 40 percent of the total area of the ITIR and the remaining will be for other infrastructure like roads, buildings and other utilities.

The Andhra Pradesh government has identified three locations including one at the international airport covering about 150 sq kilometers in Hyderabad for the ITIR.

"A special purpose vehicle will be floated to execute the ITIR project," a senior state IT department official said.

Speaking on National e-Governance Program, Chandrasekhar said the government is going to spend Rs 40,000 crore in three to four years on different projects of the NeGP.

This includes inital two to three years of the operational phase. The implementation of the project and the process of making services available is expected to complete by 2014," he said. .

He said the NeGP consists of two parts--one is delivery of e-enabled services to citizens and business and among various government departments and the second part is to create mechanism for the people to access services.

Replying to a question on software exports, he said there is a dip in the growth rate in terms of exports by 6 per cent in 2009-10 and about 15 per cent in 2008-09.

However, he said the second half of 2008-09 and first half of 2009-10 was flat. The total IT exports from the country stood at USD 63 billion last year.