The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) has announced the creation of a forum on the booming Indian animation and gaming industry this week. This is a second big step after the formation of the Indian Games Industry and Trade Association, apty acronymed iGITA, in January to boost Indian participation in gaming and for India to advance from Outsourcistan to a competitor in an increasingly global gaming market. Electronic Arts and Microsoft India are the only big Western names in the list of iGITA founding members and the focus still seems to lie on mobile gaming but to see the ongoing institutionalization happening so quickly is a good sign. At the same time, for the external observer, it's interesting to not what categorizations are made in the process, e.g. coupling animation and gaming (with a rhetorical focus on animation, still). In both areas combined, analysts expect, 30000 experts are going to be needed in the near future. Maybe it could be worthwhile to pick up some Hindi :)

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