CIS-A2K

The key mandate of the Access to Knowledge project at CIS (CIS-A2K) is to work towards catalysing the growth of the open knowledge movement in south Asia and in Indic languages. From September 2012, CIS has been actively involved in growing the open knowledge movement in India through a grant received from the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF). The current focus of the CIS-A2K team spans over 5 language areas (Kannada, Konkani, Marathi, Odia, and Telugu), 2 community strengthening initiatives, and 6 stand-alone Wikimedia projects.

Mission

The mission of CIS-A2K is to catalyze the growth of open knowledge movement in South Asia and in Indic languages. Within the Wikimedia universe CIS-A2K specifically strives to further grow the Indic and English Wikimedia projects and communities by:

supporting and serving the Indian Wikimedia communities in all possible ways;
building institutional partnerships;
bringing more content under free license;
designing and executing projects with community participation;
strengthening the Wikimedia volunteers; and
fostering and enabling an appropriate legal and technological ecosystem.

Work Plans

Work plans and other programme documents can be accessed here:

Activities and Feedback

If you have a general proposal/suggestion for Access to Knowledge team you can write on the requests page. If you have appreciations or feedback on our work, please share it on feedback page.

Recent Posts

Odia Language Classics could Now be Read from Phones, Tablets and of course from Computers! — by Prasad Krishna — last modified Dec 15, 2015 08:12 AM: Odia Wikisource, a sister project of Odia Wikipedia and a free online Odia-language library is celebrating its first anniversary in Bhubaneswar tomorrow. Available online at or.wikisource.org, the project finally went live in last year on October 20 after being incubated over two years. In a nutshell, it not just provides free and open access to readers to access text that are out of copyright or available under free license, but also allows them to contribute in either digitizing copyright-free text or correcting mistakes made by others.
Odia Wikisource to Celebrate its First Anniversary Tomorrow! — by Prasad Krishna — last modified Dec 15, 2015 08:14 AM: Odia Wikisource, a sister project of Odia Wikipedia and a free online Odia language library, will celebrate its first anniversary in Odisha capital tomorrow.
India and France to Digitise Manuscripts, Artworks & Archives — by Prasad Krishna — last modified Dec 15, 2015 08:15 AM: The Indian and French governments have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) which will assist in technical knowledge sharing, competency, skill building and cultural exchange between the two countries, as per a PIB release.
One Thousand Books Online — by Prasad Krishna — last modified Dec 15, 2015 08:16 AM
JP Das's Books to be Made Available Free on Wikipedia — by Prasad Krishna — last modified Dec 15, 2015 08:18 AM: Noted Odia-language author and art historian Jagannath Prasad Das's works will be available on Wikipedia for free.
ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପାଠାଗାରର ଆବଶ୍ୟକତା (Need for an Odia-language Wikisource) — by Subhashish Panigrahi — last modified Dec 15, 2015 08:21 AM: This post is about the Odia library movement and the conventional archival, touch-bases on the problems with dissemination of knowledge with more public domain books that are entering into the "rare and perishing" category, a comparative study of the conventional and new medium--like Wikisource--for book archival. It sheds light on how Wikisource functions as a collaborative platform in engaging with readers for digitizing books that are yet to be digitized.
Open Access Week Round-Up — by Prasad Krishna — last modified Dec 15, 2015 08:21 AM: Here is a round-up of events held at the University of Otago over Open Access Week. Subhashish Panigrahi made a presentation for the staff members of libraries across New Zealand. The event was organised by the University of Otago.
Workshop on Digital Annotation and Content Generation with research scholars in Pune from Oct 30, 2015 11:00 AM to Oct 31, 2015 05:00 PM — KSP Women’s Studies Centre, Pune, — by Abhinav Garule: The Centre for Indian Languages in Higher Education (CILHE) is conducting a two-day workshop on Digital Annotation and Content Generation with research scholars at KSP Women’s Studies Centre, Pune on October 30-31, 2015.
Odia Wikisource to Celebrate Its First Anniversary in Bhubaneswar — by Subhashish Panigrahi — last modified Dec 15, 2015 08:19 AM: Odia Wikisource, a sister project of Odia Wikipedia and a free online Odia-language library is celebrating its first anniversary in Bhubaneswar tomorrow i.e., 25th October, 2015.
WikipediansSpeak: Telugu Language Library Catalog Project Helps Wikipedia Grow — by Subhashish Panigrahi — last modified Dec 15, 2015 08:06 AM: In 2013, the interview project “WikipediansSpeak” was launched in response to observations that many noteworthy Wikimedians were being underrepresented both locally and globally. Not just them personally—their work, and the communities they represent, were also unknown to the Wikimedia community and the outside world.