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Protecting the Territory, Killing the Map
The politics of making and using maps in India has taken a sudden and complex turn with the publication of the draft Geospatial Information Regulation Bill, 2016. Contrary to the expectations arising out of several government schemes that are promoting the development of the new digital economy in India – from start-ups to the ongoing expansion of connectivity network – the Bill seems to be undoing various economic and humanitarian efforts, and other opportunities involving maps. This article by Sumandro Chattapadhyay and Adya Garg was published by The Wire on May 16, 2016.
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from IIM, Ahmedabad
This post provides a factual description about the operation of Ministry of Human Resource Development IPR Chair’s Intellectual Property Education, Research and Public Outreach (IPERPO) scheme in IIM, Ahmedabad.
Draft Law Would Prohibit Showing ‘Disputed Areas’ on Maps of India
Maps that label geographic areas of conflict as “disputed” territories in India could put one behind bars for seven years with 1B Indian Rupees (US$15M) penalty if a recently proposed bill becomes law.
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from Delhi University
This post provides a factual description about the operation of Ministry of Human Resource Development IPR Chair’s Intellectual Property Education, Research and Public Outreach (IPERPO) scheme in Delhi University.
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from NUJS
This post provides a factual description about the operation of Ministry of Human Resource Development IPR Chair’s Intellectual Property Education, Research and Public Outreach (IPERPO) scheme in the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences.
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from NALSAR
This post provides a factual description about the operation of Ministry of Human Resource Development IPR Chair’s Intellectual Property Education, Research and Public Outreach (IPERPO) scheme in NALSAR.
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from IIT, Kharagpur
This post provides a factual description about the operation of Ministry of Human Resource Development IPR Chair’s Intellectual Property Education, Research and Public Outreach (IPERPO) scheme in the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur.
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from JNU
This post provides a factual description about the operation of Ministry of Human Resource Development IPR Chair’s Intellectual Property Education, Research and Public Outreach (IPERPO) scheme in the Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi.
Kannada Wikipedia edit-a-thon organised at Sagara, Karnataka
A two-day-long Kannada Wikipedia edit-a-thon was organised at Sagara, Karnataka during January 26-27. A photowalk was also organised on the 25th to cover places of encyclopedic importance.
Legal Challenges to Mapping in India #1 - Laws, Policies, and Cases
Responding to the draft Geospatial Information Regulation Bill and the draft National Geospatial Policy made public recently, this post provides an overview of the present configuration of laws, policies, and guidelines that provides the legal framework in India for governance of creation and sharing of geospatial data in India. The post also studies these policies in action by describing the key legal cases around the creation and use of geospatial data. The next post of this series will document the reflections and opinions of the key geospatial industry actors in India, as well as the free and open source mapping community.
Wikipedia’s 15th birthday inspires Bangla translators; Odia-language Women’s History Month edit-a-thons
Bangla-language Wikipedians translated about 600 articles for their language’s Wikipedia; Odia-language Wikimedians hosted their second annual Women’s History Month edit-a-thon.
Indian Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion Discussion Paper on Standard Essential Patents
India’s Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (“DIPP”) released in March, earlier this year, a discussion paper on standard essential patents and their availability on fair, reasonable and non discriminatory terms.
Indian English Wikipedian Nvvchar completes 1500 Did You Know articles
Indian English Wikipedian Nvvchar has completed 1500 Did you know articles. This is the second highest on English Wikipedia.
Accessible ICT Procurement
Today in India there is an excellent opportunity to address the needs of persons with disabilities through accessible ICT procurement. There is a growing body of evidence globally to demonstrate that governments are successfully using accessible procurement as a means of ensuring the human rights of persons with disabilities,. They are amongst the largest purchasers of IT in any country and by requiring accessible products and services, ensure that all citizens with disabilities and government employees who are disabled are able to access and use public infrastructure and communication. CIS along with 20 other organisations petition the Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment, Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Information Technology to bring in accessibility considerations within the draft Procurement Bill.
Identity of the Aadhaar Act: Supreme Court and the Money Bill Question
A writ petition has been filed by former Union minister Jairam Ramesh on April 6 challenging the constitutionality and legality of the treatment of this Act as a money bill. The Supreme Court heard the matter on April 25 and invited the Union government to present its view. It is our view that the Supreme Court can not only review the Lok Sabha speaker’s decision, but should also ask the government to draft the Aadhaar Bill again, this time with greater parliamentary and public deliberation. Vanya Rakesh and Sumandro Chattapadhyay wrote this article on The Wire.
Stats for March 2016
CIS-A2K team closely works with 5 Indian languages, we call as focus language areas. Here are the stats for the month of March 2016.
Facebook: A Platform with Little Less Sharing of Personal Information
As Facebook becomes less personal, what happens to digital friendship?
Images and links matter quality
Wikipedia articles are considered of a higher quality when they have illustrations. An article without images is considered dull. Wikipedia is all about references. Any information on Wikipedia is encouraged to have verifiable citations. Hence images and external links form a criterion for quality of articles on Wikipedias. This blog post tries to analyse the current scenario of CIS-A2K's Focus language areas with respect to images and links.
Breakthroughs Needed For Digital India
It's time the government accepts that current policies are not enough to bring about Digital India.
Shape of IPRs and Agriculture post the WTO Nairobi Ministerial
CIS is running a series of meetups focused on intellectual property to bring folks interested in IP law to discuss developments in access to knowledge, climate change, health, trade, etc. At the first meet-up in February, Prof. Biswajit Dhar delivered a short talk on intellectual property rights and agriculture in a post-Nairobi Ministerial world. This post is a summary of his talk.
