Theobald, who is a member of Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) task force on 'Y2K preparedness' said only multinational firms operating in the country, has shown some resolve to face the problem. "Companies like Hindustan Lever has been working on a war-footing, whereas public sector companies and Government organisations have been, so far, faring not upto the expected lines in reducing the risks arising out of Y2K problem," he said.

Chairman of Ernst and Young, KN Memani said a project review on Y2K undertaken by the agencyshowed that 90 per cent of all computer applications worldwide will fail or create serious erroneous results on the dawn of the new year.

Memani said India had been slow in identifying the Y2K as one of the priority areas, to be tackled on a priority basis. Theobald said though big Indian companies like Reliance and Tatas have made good progress in making its systems Y2K compliant, some grey areas remained to be tackled. Theobald said while some PSUs like the oil companies have made some progress on Y2K issue, PSUs in the power sector and Government departments themselves have overlooked the Y2K compliance efforts. "There is very low awareness in the Government departments and companies in the power sector on Y2K issue," he said, adding that the firms are far behind the schedule on making their systems compliant to the Y2K problem.

With only nine more months to go, firms are running out of time on the Y2K problem, Theobald warned. VV Ranganathan of Ernst and Young said his firm has laid out a plan to helpcompanies to evaluate a project plan for overcoming the Y2K issue and all its aspects. This include project management, enterprise awareness, setting milestones, allocating resources, ensuring documentation clarity and establishing a contingency plan as conceived by the companies management, he said. "Ernest and Young would prepare a progress audit to assist management to evaluate the progress of the Y2K project periodically and ensure completion of it within the stipulated time and cost," Ranganathan said. According to Theobald, it was upto the companies to take a decision on the menace and complete the compliance efforts falling with the deadline. He termed the reported statements saying India would face less problems due to y2k bugs in comparison with the western world a myth.