Centre for Internet and Society

Wiki Media Foundation keen on developing Urdu Wikipedia

praskrishna — 2014-11-01T13:29:32Z

The Wikipedia India Community Consultation 2014 was organized by the Wiki Media Foundation (WMF) and Wikipedia India Chapter in collaboration with Centre for Internet Society (CIS A2K) Bangalore on The venue was Movenpick Hotel and scheduled for October 4th and 5th here.

The article by Nisar Ahmed Syed was originally published on the website of Karnataka Muslims on October 22, 2014.

India Community Consultation 2014 held in Bangalore

The objectives of the meet up according to the organizers are “to share views and preferences on the most effective ways to pursue our shared vision of creating and sharing free knowledge in India and in the Indian languages, and to arrive at an agreement on a road map for a future where its resources are better utilized, its volunteers are better served and progress on its mission is more steadily attained. “

I reached Bangalore on 3rd October and invited Urdu speaking people and the Urdu media from Bangalore for a general meet up. Mr. Azeez Belgaumi a renowned Urdu Poet & writer and Mr. Syed Tanveer Ahmed, as senior Journalist heading “Karnataka Muslims” News portal approached me and we had a good conversation to know more about Urdu Wikipedia. They appreciated Wikipedia and promised to extend their support to the Urdu Wikipedia.

Mr. Syed Tanveer Ahmed and Mr. Azeez Belgaumi promised to take up the initiative to conduct some Wiki workshops in collaboration with Salam foundation and CIS A2K. Mr. Vishnu the Project Director CIS has also agreed to extend his best support to organize the outreach programmes in Bengaluru and other parts of India to develop Urdu Wikipedia.

An introductory meeting was held in the evening of 3rd October in which members of WMF and the Wikipedians representing languages viz. English, Urdu, Hindi, Bengali, Odia, Assamese, Kannada, Konkani, Sanskrit, Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam, Marathi, and Gujarati attended.

On 4th October after noon the scheduled meet up was conducted wherein WMF Senior Director Grantmaking Mrs. Anasuya Sengupta from US, Head of Wikimedia Grants & Global South Partnerships Mr. Asaf Bartov from US, Chief Financial Officer Mr. Garfiled Byrd from France and Vice-Chair of the Board of Trustees Mr. Petricio Lorente from Argentina Trustee Bishakha Datta participated. Mr. Gagan Sethi from Counterviews Gujarat facilitated the programme.

The Indic language bureaucrats, sysops and representatives participated actively and focused on the topic how to improve the Wikipedia in Indic languages. This session gone up to 7 p.m. and in the night too, the delegates had the get together to discuss on various issued related to Wikimedia programmes in India.

On the 5th October morning the work shop continued with dignified discussions. Various user groups from different languages took part and presented their views and successes. The discussions focused on wiki tools, various practical problems, do’s and don’ts. It’s a fabulous meet to take part, comprehend, and show the spirit of volunteerism towards Wikipedia.

During discussion on Urdu language, Mr. Asaf appreciated the contributions of Mr. Muhammad Shuaib. Mr. Nisar Ahmed Syed administrator in Telugu Wikipedia represented Urdu Wikipedia too as he is a contributor to Urdu Wikipedia. He discussed issues and stressed the need of outreach and developmental activities for Urdu Wikipedia in India. Mr. Muzammil Ahmed from Hindi and Urdu Wikipedia advocated its importance.

Ms. Anasuya and Mr. Asaf Bartov accepted the need of Urdu Wiki development programmes in India and they said they are ready to prepare a road map for the same.

Finally with the initiations of Mr. Nisar Ahmed Syed and with the kind cooperation of Mr. Asaf Bartov and Mrs. Anasuya Sengupta, an Urdu user group was set and introduced. The user group initially was gathered by backing of Mr. Asaf Bartov. The group has Mr. Syed Nisar Ahmed (Pune), Mr. Muzammil Ahmed (Hyderabad), Mr. Azeez Belgaumi (Bengaluru) and Mr. Satdeep Gil (Punjab).

The contributions of Muzammil Ahmed and Nisar Ahmed to Urdu Wikipedia were appreciated. The WMF team thanked all the Urdu users from India who rendered their best contributions.

Emphasis was laid to improve the Urdu Wikipedia India group.

As WMF intends to focus on the online encyclopedia WIKIPEDIA in the Indian languages Urdu users too expressed willingness to work for the mother tongue Urdu by enriching Urdu Wikipedia.

Mr. Nisar Ahmed said, “It is true that the awareness among the Urdu speaking community about Urdu Wikipedia is very less.” He emphasized the need to take a small step to lead to a large extent to bring awareness by means of outreach programmes, meet ups, seminars. It was accepted and appreciated to initiate outreach work among the Urdu speaking states and clusters in India.

In India about 450 newspapers and magazines are being published in Urdu language. And it is an amazing fact that many of the Urdu newspapers are using the Wikipedia as their source material from English Wikipedia as it has a large and authentic content, but they are not aware about the need to enrich Urdu Wikipedia. It should be known that everyone can edit, resource and enrich it. Hence it is decided to start a user group for Urdu Wikipedia India and to bring the same message to the masses.

“Bring Urdu Wikipedia from budding stage to a blooming stage.”

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/news/karnataka-muslims-nisar-ahmed-syed-october-22-2014-wiki-media-foundation-keen-on-developing-urdu-wikipedia

Converting from nonUnicode (Nudi, Baraha, ...) font encoding to Unicode Kannada

pavanaja — 2016-10-23T15:36:25Z

People have been using computers for typing and printing Kannada text for more than 25 years. Most of the usage of Kannada on computers was limited to the DTP arena.

People made use of packages like PageMaker (Version 6.5 or 7) to type and compose pages. Even now, many people still use these packages for Kannada DTP work. The text entered into these packages is stored as font glyph codes rather than character encodings. Non-Unicode truetype fonts like Nudi, Baraha, ShreeLipi, Akruti, etc, are some of the most popular fonts being used.

The system does not understand these characters as Kannada characters. Any text based operations like search, replace, sorting, spell-check, text-to-speech, etc, are not possible with this kind of text. Employing Unicode for all digitisation works of Kannada text solves this problem. Usage of Unicode for Kannada has become prominent only recently. All websites like Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia, Wikisource, etc, want the text only in Unicode. There is still a large amount of text entered and stored with old non-Unicode font based encodings. These are mostly present in the form of PageMaker files. This blog post explains the process of converting the text present in PageMaker into Kannada Unicode text.

The Kannada and Culture Department of the Government of Karnataka have released Unicode complaint open-type fonts and Unicode based software for Kannada under GPL. These are available for free download on their website (http://kannadasiri.co.in/index/software). Download and
install “Ascii to Unicode Kannada Converter” from this page. This software works only in Windows. Now you are ready to convert the text from PageMaker file into Unicode.

Open the PageMaker file. Select the Text tool depicted by a big “T” shaped icon. Click anywhere in the text area. Select the entire text (Ctrl-A followed by Ctrl-C). Now open Notepad and paste this text into that (press Ctrl-V). The text will appear gibberish in Notepad. Don’t worry about it. Save the file as plain text file (.TXT file). Remember where you have saved the file.

Now run the “Kannada ASCII Unicode Converter” software. In the first textbox enter the name of the ASCII file to be converted (the file you just saved from Notepad). In the bottom textbox enter a filename for the Unicode text file that will be created by the software. Select the default “GOK (Kuvempu Nudi Baraha)”, or other encoding as the case may be, as the encoding from which the text has to be converted. Click on the button written “ಪರಿವರ್ತಿಸಿ”. It will show the progress of conversion.

Once the conversion is complete, it will display an appropriate message to indicate completion of the conversion. If you open the text file created by the software, it will have the text converted into Unicode. This text can be used in Wikisource, Wikipedia, etc.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/converting-from-non-unicode-nudi-baraha-font-encoding-to-unicode-kannada

Tulu Wikipedia Workshop cum Editathon at Udupi

pavanaja — 2014-10-31T14:54:07Z

A three-day programme was held at Udupi from October 15 to 17, 2014 with an aim to increase the presence of Tulu in the online world. The first day comprised the inauguration programme and a workshop to understand the Wiki markup. The next two days were devoted to the edit-a-thon where participants added articles to Tulu Wikipedia.

The team comprised 18 girls from the Government PU College, Udupi and some other women. The event was organised by Tulu Sahitya Academy and sponsored by MGM College, Udupi and the Regional Research Centre, Udupi. Janaki Brahmavar, Chairperson of Tulu Sahitya Academy, presided over the function. She spoke about the efforts being made to add Tulu in Unicode. Jayakar Shetty, President Tulu Okkoota, expressed his happiness over the fact that it was a batch of about 20 girls who participated in the workshop cum edit-a-thon. There is a grouse that male editors far outnumber females in editing Wikipedia. This could be one instance where only female editors actively added articles to Tulu Wikipedia over three days. The programme was well covered by the print and television media. The good news is that the girls who participated in the edit-a-thon have continued adding articles. As on October 26, 2014, the total number of articles in Tulu Wikipedia has gone up to 574.

Tulu is one of the Dravidian languages spoken primarily by people from the south coast of Karnataka and north coast of Kerala[1]. As per the Census of 2001, there were 1,722,768 Tulu speakers [2]; figures of 2011 census are still not available. There are a lot of Tulu-speaking people residing outside Karnataka and Kerala in Mumbai, Goa and Gulf countries. It is estimated that the total number of Tulu-speaking people is more than 2.5 million. There has been a long-standing demand to include Tulu in the 8^th Schedule of the Constitution of India[3], [4]. Tulu had its own script long ago, it is not in use. Currently, Tulu is written in the Kannada script. Tulu has a vast vocal tradition, and there is a huge collection of knowledge that is transferred across generations orally. Efforts are being made to document this vocal tradition. The history of Tulu literature has already been documented in Kannada. Recently, the Karnataka government introduced Tulu as an optional language for schools in Mangalore and Udupi districts. However, these students don't have many books to read apart from the prescribed textbooks. There are some Tulu books in the creative writing domain, but there is hardly any book of an encyclopaedic nature in Tulu language which the students can refer to. This is where Tulu Wikipedia becomes extremely significant.

Tulu Wikipedia has been in incubation since 2007[5]. Some editing activities in Tulu Wikipedia were carried out during 2007-08. But the initial momentum gradually subsided, and most editors stopped editing. Tulu Wikipedia thereafter went into a dormant status. During the Alvas Vishwa Nudisiri Programme at Moodabidre in December 2013, Dr BA VivekaRai, former vice-chancellor of Kannada University, who was the President of the cultural and literary meet, dwelt at length on the importance of implementing Tulu language in technology. This was followed by a talk by Dr UB Pavanaja, a member of the CIS-A2K team. He continued from where Viveka Rai left off, and talked about bringing world knowledge in Tulu, rejuvenating Tulu Wikipedia, and pressuring the state and Union governments towards including Tulu in the 8^th Schedule of the Constitution.

Subsequently, a workshop on editing Tulu Wikipedia was held at Mangalore on January 19 this year under the leadership and initiative of Dr BA VivekaRai. This was followed by another edit-a-thon at Mangalore on April 5 and another workshop at Udupi on May 25. All these efforts have given a new impetus to Tulu Wikipedia. The number of articles in Tulu Wikipedia was 147 as in March 2014, which went up to 365 in July. The Tulu Sahitya Academy realised the importance and pitched into the effort of making it live.

[1] http://www.ethnologue.com/subgroups/dravidian

[2] http://www.censusindia.gov.in/%28S%28i4hlwuf0ltgmdnejdawhdr45%29%29/Census_Data_2001/Census_Data_Online/Language/partb.aspx

[3] http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/requests-to-include-38-languages-in-constitution-pending-govt/article58221.ece

[4] http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mangalore/Include-Tulu-in-8th-Schedule-demands-forum/articleshow/38992142.cms

[5] http://tools.wmflabs.org/meta/catanalysis/?title=Wp%2Ftcy&cat=0&wiki=incubatorwiki#overview_edits

Media Coverage

http://www.mangaloretoday.com/newsbriefs/Wikipedia-can-establish-Tulu-in-a-wider-way.html

http://v4news.com/enliven-the-tulu-viki-fidia-first-and-then-add-tulu-to-the-8th-schedule-dr-ug-pavanaja-bangalore-rep-in-udupi/

http://www.mangaloretoday.com/newsbriefs/2-Day-Workshop-on-Tulu-in-internet.html

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/tulu-wikipedia-workshop-cum-editathon-at-udupi

Samskrita Vaibhavam (Sanskrit Wiki Outreach Program)

Shubha and Sayant Mahato — 2014-10-31T14:02:51Z

To celebrate the revival of Sanskrit language, the Bangalore chapter of Samskrita Bharati organised a two-day mega event "Samskrita Vaibhavam" at VSR Kalyan Mantapa in Bangalore on August 9 and 10, 2014.

Competition, Conference & Exhibition

The theme of the event was promotion of Sanskrit. It offered an encapsulation of the culture and heritage woven into Sanskrit. No wonder, the event attracted more than thousand samskrita premis or Sanskrit enthusiasts, who actively participated in the proceedings.

As is well known, Samskrita Bharati with a missionary zeal, is engaged in popularising Sanskrit language and demonstrating to the world that Sanskrit cannot only be easily learnt by anyone but also by those who can easily speak in Sanskrit and transact daily activities too. Samskrita Bharati organises Samskrita Shibirams through which these concepts are popularised.

Notable during the event was a seminar on "Why Samskrit". Dr. Chamu Krishna Shastry, Samskrita Bharati; Dr. Srinivas Varkhede, Karnataka Samskrit University; Dr. Ramachandra Bhat, Veda Vignyana Gurukulam; Dr. Balachandra Rao, mathematecian and astrophysicist; Dr. VR Anil Kumar, Kalpa Heritage Trust; and Uttara Nerurkar, Vedic scholar, were the expert speakers.

Additionally, an exhibition was also organised. Here, there was a stall on "Samskrita Wikipedia" (Sa.Wikipedia). This was a grand attraction for visitors as Sanskrit Wikipedia showed that (Sanskrit) knowledge can be accessed in a split second with a click on a computer.

The Sanskrit Wikipedia wing of Samskrita Bharati is thankful for the timely support from CIS-A2K, which was used for designing and printing handbills and brochures about Sanskrit Wikipedia. The brochures, which were distributed among participants, were well appreciated as it helped them connect with Sa.Wikipedia, and the myriad possibilities available to them by learning Sanskrit.

The entire event was of great significance in the promotion of Sanskrit language.

Acknowledgement from Samskrita Bharati

This article was written by Shubha and Sayant Mahato.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/samskrita-vaibhavam

Guidelines for Examination of Computer Related Inventions: Mapping the Stakeholders' Response

nehaa — 2015-01-05T17:01:50Z

The procedure and tests surrounding software patenting in India have remained ambiguous since the Parliament introduced the term “per se” through the Patent (Amendment) Act, 2002. In 2013, the Indian Patent Office released Draft Guidelines for the Examination of Computer Related Inventions, in an effort to clarify some of the ambiguity. Through this post, CIS intern, Shashank Singh, analyses the various responses by the stakeholders to these Guidelines and highlights the various issues put forth in the responses.

I. Introduction

In June, 2013 the Office of Controller General of Patents, Designs and Trademarks ('IPO'), released the Draft Guidelines for Examination of Computer Related Inventions ('Guidelines'). The aim of the Guidelines was to provide some much needed clarity around patentability of Computer Related Inventions ('CRI'). The Guidelines discuss the procedure to be adopted by the examiners while examining CRI patent applications. In response to the Guidelines, several stakeholders submitted their comments to either accept, reject or modify the interpretation provided by the IPO. Most of the comments circled around the phraseology of Section 3(k), Patents Act, 1970 ('Act'). In its current form, Section 3(k) reads as "a mathematical or business method or a computer programme per se or algorithms", and comes under Chapter III of the Act which lists inventions that are not patentable. Simply put, this means that software cannot be patented in India, unless it is embedded/combined in with some hardware. While this is the most widely accepted interpretation of this Section 3(k), there have been contradictory interpretations as well.

In this note, I shall look at the various ambiguities surrounding patent application for CRIs. The note has been divided into five parts. Part II briefly reiterates the legislative history behind Section 3(k) and CRI patenting. Part III would briefly summarize the various parts of the Guidelines where the IPO has given their interpretation and opinion on the various issues surrounding CRI patenting. Part IV would then map the position of the stakeholders on each ambiguous point. Lastly, Part V would give the conclusion.

II. Legislative History

Under the Patent Act, 1970, prior to the 2002 Amendment, there was no specific provision under which software could be patented. Nonetheless, there was no explicit embargo on software patenting either. For an invention to be patentable, under Section 2(1) (j) of the Act, which defines an invention, general criteria of novelty, non-obviousness and usefulness must be applied. Software is generally in the form of a mathematical formula or algorithm, both of which are not patentable under the Act as they do not produce anything tangible. However, if combined or embedded in a machine or a computer, the resultant product can be patented as it would pass the aforementioned criteria.

The Parliament, in 1999, sought to amend the Act to bring it in conformity with the changing technological landscape. Consequently, the Patent (Second Amendment) Bill, 1999 was introduced in the Parliament which was then referred to a Joint Parliamentary Committee ('JPC'). The ensuing Bill proposed Section 3(k) in its current phraseology. It reasoned that:

" In the new proposed clause (k) the words ''per se" have been inserted. This change has been proposed because sometimes the computer programme may include certain other things, ancillary thereto or developed thereon. The intention here is not to reject them for grant of patent if they are inventions. However, the computer programmes as such are not intended to be granted patent. This amendment has been proposed to clarify the purpose. "

The Bill was then enacted as the Patent (Amendment) Act, 2002 and reads in its current form as:

Section 3(k) - "a mathematical or business method or a computer programme per se or algorithm"

This created some ambiguity with respect to the interpretation of the term "per se". It was interpreted to mean that software cannot be patented unless it is combined with some hardware. This combination would then have to comply with all the tests of patentability under the Act.

In December, 2004 the Patent (Amendment) Ordinance, 2004 ('Ordinance') was enacted which amended Section 3(k) to divide it into two parts, namely Section 3(k) and Section 3(ka).

"(k) a computer programme per se other than its technical application to industry or a combination with hardware;

(ka) a mathematical method or a business method or algorithms; ".

In February, 2005 the Ordinance was introduced in the Parliament as the Patent (Amendment) Bill, 2005.This included the amendment to Section 3(k) as under the Ordinance. In the Objects and Reasons it clarified that the intention behind the amendment was to " modify and clarify the provisions relating to patenting of software related inventions when they have technical application to industry or in combination with hardware ". However, the final amending Act did not divide Section 3(k) as proposed by the Ordinance. In the press note, by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry it was noted that:

"It is proposed to omit the clarification relating to patenting of software related inventions introduced by the Ordinance as Section 3(k) and 3 (ka). The clarification was objected to on the ground that this may give rise to monopoly of multinationals."

Later, in the same year the IPO release a Manual of Patent Office Practice and Procedure, 2005. Here, it noted that "a computer readable storage medium having a program recorded thereon…irrespective of the medium of its storage are not patentable". This did nothing to clarify the ambiguity that existed.

Similarly, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Commerce, 88^th Report on the Patent and Trademark System in India (2008) noted the uncertainty surrounding the term 'per se' and said that there was a need to clarify the same. It did not do anything in furtherance of pointing this out.

The 2011 Manual of Patent Office and Procedure, 2011 tried to elaborately deal with the ambiguity. Nonetheless, substantively it did not change the uncertainty. It stated that:

"If the claimed subject matter in a patent application is only a computer programme, it is considered as a computer programme per se and hence not patentable. Claims directed at computer programme products' are computer programmes per se stored in a computer readable medium and as such are not allowable. Even if the claims, inter alia, contain a subject matter which is not a computer programme, it is examined whether such subject matter is sufficiently disclosed in the specification and forms an essential part of the invention."

III. Draft Guidelines for Examination of Computer Related Inventions, 2013

The Draft Guidelines were released on June 28, 2013, following which stakeholders were invited to give comments.

Terms/ Definitions used while dealing with CRIs

At the outset, the IPO put a caveat to say that the Guidelines do not constitute 'rule making'. Consequently, in case of a conflict between the Guidelines and the Act, the Act shall prevail. After the Introduction and Background, in Part I and Part II respectively, the Guidelines looked at the various definitions/terms that correspond to CRI patent claims in Part III. In all, there were 21 such definitions/terms that were sought to be clarified. These definitions can be branched into three categories.

Category I- Where the definition/term was borrowed from some other Indian stature.
Category II- Where the definition/term was construed according to the plain dictionary meaning. Category III- Where the Guidelines tried to give their interpretation to the term/definition.

Under Category I, there were seven definitions whose meaning was derived from some other stature. The meaning of Computer Network, Computer System, Data, Information and Function were derived from Information Technology Act, 2000 ('IT Act'). The definition of Computer Programme was taken from Copyright Act, 1957. Lastly, the definition of Computer was taken from both Copyright Act and IT Act.

Under Category II, the Guidelines underscored five definitions whose meaning was to be borrowed from the Oxford Dictionary. These were algorithm, software, per se, firm ware and hardware. Importantly, it was noted that these definitions have not been defined anywhere in Indian legislations. Lastly, under Category III the Guidelines tried to interpret certain terms according to their understanding. These terms included, Embedded Systems, Technical Effects, Technical Advancement, Mathematical Methods, Business Methods etc.

Categorization of CRI claims

In Part IV, the Guidelines tried to broadly group the various CRI patent applications under four heads. These categorizations tried to give an insight into what the patent examiners look for while rejecting a patent application.

Method/process:

Without defining what a method or process would entail, the Guidelines stated that any claim carrying a preamble with "method/process for..." shall not be patentable. It clarified that claims relating to mathematical methods, business methods, computer programme per se, algorithm or mental act are cannot be patented as they are prime illustrations of claims under this category. Further, the Guidelines gave specific examples of each of the aforementioned claims.

Apparatus/system

The second category consisted of claims whose preamble stated that the patent application was for an "apparatus/system". Under this, the patent application must not only comply with the standard tests of patentability- novelty, inventive step and industrial applicability, but also define the inventive constructional or hardware feature of the CRI. However, in contradictory statements, the Guidelines try to narrow down the prerequisites for a claim under this category, only to state that such claims cannot be patented.

Computer readable medium

While stating this as a category, the Guidelines do not elaborate on what this exactly means and what types of claims would be rejected being under this category.

Computer program product

This category includes computer programs that are expressed on a computer readable medium (CD, DVD, Signal etc.). Further, infusing ambiguity to the debate, the Guidelines failed to differentiate between Computer Readable Medium and Computer Program Product.

Examination Procedure used by IPO

The examination procedure for CRI patent application in the Guidelines is similar to other patent applications which look at novelty, inventive step and industrial applicability. However, claims relating to determination of specific subject matter under the excluded categories (Method/Process, Computer Readable Medium, Apparatus/system, and Computer Program Product) require specific examination skills from the examiner.

Under the excluded category itself, Method/Process requires subjective judgement by the examiner as to whether such a claim qualifies to be classified under this category or not. For investigating the inventive step involved in the 'method/process', the technical advancement over existing knowledge in the technological field has to be analyzed. Any patent claim from a non-technological field shall not be considered.

The Guidelines then tried to clarify the controversial Section 3(k) which eliminates the patenting of computer programmes per se. While previously stating that the definition of the term 'per se' as borrowed from the Oxford dictionary meant 'by itself', the Guidelines stated that computer programme loaded on a general purpose computer or related device cannot be patented. Nonetheless, while filing patent application for a novel hardware, with a loaded computer programme, the likelihood patenting the combination cannot be ruled out. Further, the stated hardware must be something more than a general purpose machine. Essentially, a patent for a novel computer programme combined with a novel hardware, which must be more than a general purpose machine, may be considered for patenting. It then gave several examples which were followed by flowcharts to further clarify ambiguities surrounding CRI patentability. Interestingly, all these examples and flowcharts only listed the inventions that are not patentable.

IV. Response by Stakeholders

Many and various comments were received from 36 stakeholders that including lawyers, civil society members, law firms, students, global and national trade bodies and industry representatives.

Our compilation (and the first level of analysis) of the Stakeholders' Responses is available here.

While all the stakeholders' applauded the much needed transparency in the IPO, substantively they differed considerably on various issues and highlighted some inconsistencies. In this part, I shall map the responses of the various stakeholders'. While doing so, I shall also try and find specific patterns to the responses corresponding to the following segments:

1. Civil Society

2. Law Firm/Advocates ('law Firms')

3. Industry/ Industry Representatives/Global Trade Body (Industry)

4. Students

These segments have been created on the assumption that each of the aforementioned segment would lobby for similar kind of policy.

Interpretation of Section 3(k)

One of the major points of deviation between the stakeholders was regarding the interpretation of Section 3(k) which encapsulates the term "computer programme per se".

The industry responded by critiquing the current CRI patenting regime in India as being "restrictive" ( FICCI , NASSCOM, US India Business Council and Bosch ). While some industry representatives sought clarifications due to uncertain phraseology, there was no industry representative that favored restricted interpretation to exclude software patenting altogether. While opposing the Guidelines, they sought assistance from the legislative history behind introduction of Section 3(k). It was pointed out that the term 'per se' was included to raise the threshold of patentability to something higher than the previous patentability standard, but it did not explicitly exclude patent protection for software.

The general perception of the stakeholders, keeping in mind the current Guidelines, was that for patenting software it had to be combined with some hardware. This combination would then be scrutinized against the triple test of novelty, inventive step and industrial application.

While the Guidelines noted that the hardware involved must not be general purpose hardware and that the chances of software patentability would increase significantly if novelty resides in the hardware; however, most of the industry and global trade bodies disagreed with this interpretation. They argued that if software in combination of hardware technically advances the existing technology, then such an innovation must be patentable, despite being combined with a general purpose machine (Bosch). Another explanation supporting expanded interpretation was that much of the technological innovation is accomplished through software development as compared to hardware innovation and novel software can achieve technical effect without the hardware developments ( BSA- The Software Alliance ). Consequently, software development that allows a general purpose machine to perform tasks that were once performed by a special machine must be incentivized. Some stakeholders interpreted the Guidelines to reason that hardware must be completely disregarded while examining patentability of software (Majumdar & Co. ).

Most of the responses from the civil society argued for a restricted interpretation of Section 3(k) ( Centre for Internet & Society). They concurred with the interpretation provided by the IPO to exclude software patentability. Most of the stakeholders responded seeking further clarification on the subject (Software Freedom Law Centre , K&S Partners and Xellect IP Solutions).

However, within each segments itself there was difference of opinion on the interpretation of Section 3(k). For instance, out of the five civil society members, four wanted to restrictive interpretation while one of them favoured expansive interpretation to include software patenting. Similarly, 13 law firms sought further clarification on the subject matter, while seven argued for expansive interpretation and one of them argued for restricted interpretation. The most consistent response was from the industry that clearly favoured software patenting and called the Guidelines "restrictive". Seven out of the nine industry representatives supported expansive interpretation and the other two sought further clarifications on the subject.

Section 5.4.6- Hardware

The interpretation of Section 3(k) until the release of the Guidelines was that software in combination with some hardware could be considered for patenting. However, the Guidelines increased the threshold stating that this hardware must be "something more than a general purpose machine". A stakeholder pointed out that increasing this threshold would go against the legislative intent as the requirement of a novel hardware has not been mentioned anywhere in the Act ( Anand & Anand ).

The industry's perspective on this matter was largely uniform. They pointed out the large technological field that would be eliminated from the scope of patentability if the interpretation provided by the Guidelines is adopted ( Bosch). Also, the investigation of novelty in the hardware would disincentives inventors in the field of CRIs ( Kan & Krishme ). Most of the stakeholders, across segments, sought more clarification on the role of hardware under Section 3(k) (Majumdar & Co. Centre for Internet & Society).

Comparative Analysis

Much of the criticism surrounding CRI patenting policy in India is based on the comparative inconsistency with similar laws in other jurisdictions. Comparative analysis on the subject has only been provided by the stakeholders that support software patentability. They point out that most countries like US, UK, Japan and the European Patent Convention allow patenting of software, and India must also do the same in order to comply with its international obligations under the TRIPs Agreement. Paradoxically, stakeholders who supported the current practice chose not to comparatively analyze CRI policy of other jurisdictions. While most of the stakeholders simply jumped to analyze comparative jurisprudence on the subject, only one of them gave a reasonable explanation for such a comparison ( LKS). It was noted that the Supreme Court of India and the Intellectual Property Appellate Board regularly borrow from foreign decisions to either accept or deny patents. Therefore, while formulating any policy on the matter, the position in other jurisdictions must be considered.

It was reasoned that the term 'per se' used in the Act, is similar to the European Patent Convention and UK Patent Act, 1977 where the term 'as such' has been used. Therefore, while juxtaposing both the terms, the interpretation of 'per se' must be similar to 'as such'. Consequently, software patenting must be allowed subject to the tests evolved by the courts. Similarly, the term 'as such' has been used by several Asian countries including China, Taiwan, South Korea and Japan. In these countries, software in concert with a specific hardware that resolves a technical problem thereby achieving a technical result can be patented ( Krishna and Saurastri Associates ).

Likewise, while comparing the jurisprudence of US, the landmark case Diamond vs. Diehr, which marked the beginning of software patenting was cited ( Subhojeet Ghosh and US India Business Council ). Several others argued that India must align their laws with global standards ( Bosch, Phillips Intellectual Property and Standards , Sun Smart IP Services , United Overseas Patent Firm).

Business Method

The Guidelines tried to narrow down the definition of 'Business Method' to clarify that such claims cannot be patented. It was urged that the Guidelines reconsider such a blanket embargo ( Legasis Partners- Advocates and Solicitors, Anand & Anand ). While judging patentability, a patent must not be rejected simply because it mentions business method or business method related terminology. What must be examined is whether the inventive step resides in the technical or non-technical part of the claim ( Legasis Partners- Advocates and Solicitors). A distinction must be made differentiating as to what software implementing business method and a software relating to the technical aspect of the transaction ( Anand & Anand ). While the former can be rejected, the latter must be accepted subject to the triple test of patenting.

It was pointed out that reevaluating a business method claim apart from a method involving financial transaction; monopoly claim over trade and new business strategies; monopoly claim over new types of carrying out business and method of increasing revenue; must be rejected (Law Offices of Mohan Associates , Remfry and Sagar, FICCI ). The more overarching opinion of the stakeholders was there is no objection to the exclusion of business method patents, but what constitutes business methods need more clarity (D. Moses Jeyakaran, Law Firm of Naren Thappeta , Japan Intellectual Property Association ).

Critique of Examples and Flowcharts

The Guidelines provided for several examples and flowcharts to foster a better understanding of the subject matter. However, a notable feature of each of these was that they only gave examples of what claims would be rejected. This was sufficiently pointed out by most of the stakeholders who sought more positive examples (Bosch, BSA- The Software Alliance , K&S Partners , FICCI , Xellect IP Solutions, Japan Intellectual Property Association , In-House Intellectual Property Professional Forum, NASSCOM , Obhan & Associates , Remfry & Sagar, Tata Consultancy Services ). It was pointed out that the examples have not sufficiently elaborated on their relation with Section 3(k) ( FICCI ), and some of them are "weak, obscure and incorrect" ( Software Freedom Law Centre). These examples also fail to elaborate on the tests that have previously been applied by the Patent Office ( LKS). Overall, the general perception was that, the examples were confusing and greater clarity along with positive examples was needed ( LKS, Anand & Anand ).

Interestingly, out of the 25 stakeholders' who commented on the illustrations, 16 sought positive examples. Further, most of the positive examples were sought by industry representatives and law firms who supported software patenting.

V. Conclusion

It has been over a year since IPO released the CRI Guidelines. On release, it invited suggestions in order to revise the Guidelines, but the revised version has still not been released by the IPO. The Guidelines were authored from a patent examiner's perspective; however, while doing so it obscured the matter further. It was argued that in totality the application of the Guidelines would now make the patentability of software stricter. It was also pointed out that the Guidelines have not taken into account the legislative history and the specific rejection of the Ordinance in the 2005 Amendment.

The responses received by IPO gave conflicting opinion on the same issue. In general, it can be concluded that the industry and law firms were in favour of allowing software patenting. They sought removal of the hardware requirement for software patentability. Most of the stakeholder's who favoured software patenting also undertook a comparative study of jurisdictions like US, UK, EU and Japan to point out the difference in the software patenting policy. Further, they also wanted the Guidelines to give positive examples wherein CRIs patenting has previously been allowed.

Admittedly, the Guidelines have no legal standing and much like the Patent Manual, they serve merely to guide the patent applicants and provide transparency patent examination. Overall, the Guidelines failed to explain the previous inconsistencies surrounding the subject matter. In conclusion the Guidelines mention that it would periodically release and update the Guidelines incorporating the stakeholder's comments. Considering the diverse set of opinions received by the IPO, it now needs to be seen which suggestions are accepted until the next round of comments.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/guidelines-for-examination-of-computer-related-inventions

Odia Wikisource Goes Live!

subha — 2014-11-07T13:30:46Z

Odia netizens have more than one reason to celebrate this festive season.

Odia Wikisource went live just before Deepavali and is now available for Odia readers who are eager to access Odia books online. There are over 40 million native Odia speakers living in Odisha and diaspora in the US, UK, UAE and other parts of the world and yet Odia Wikipedia currently only has 8441 articles (October 2014) as compared to Malayalam which has a comparable number of speakers and over 30,000 articles on the Malayalam Wikipedia. Internet is one of the largest sources of information.

Wikisource is an online library that holds notable published works that are in the public domain or are freely licensed as Creative Commons Share-Alike. Authors and publishers can now choose to donate their books and publications, and provide open access to readers.

Odia is the 11th Indic language to have this project, and is available at or.wikisource.org. Readers can now access many rare books, which are out of copyright, also reuse the content, and commercially reproduce the books with the power of.

None of the state's government portals in Odia have content in Unicode to make them searchable and reusable. The largest digital archive in Odia, a joint initiative of Pragati Utkal Sangha a Bhubaneswar based non-profit and National Institute of Technology Rourkela, created under the project Open Access to Oriya Books (OAOB) has over 740 books published between 1850 – 1950, which have been digitised. These are stored in a PDF format, which restricts searching of content.

Odia Wikisource went through a thorough and long approval process after it was incubated in late 2012, first by the Language Committee and then the Wikimedia Foundation's Board. Amir Aharoni, Member, Language Committee and software engineer, Wikimedia Foundation was of the opinion that Odia Wikisource, had tremendous potential, especially in educating children: "In schools in Odisha, are there lessons of Odia literature? If the answer is yes, then it can do a very simple thing - make these lessons more fun and help children learn more! Everybody says that in Kerala this worked very well with Malayalam literature."

An MoU was signed in January 2014 between Centre for Internet and Society’s Access To Knowledge (CIS-A2K) and Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS), an educational non-profit that supports over 20,000 students from indigenous communities, to collaboratively spearhead open knowledge projects. However, it was later felt that students and faculty could use their time more effectively if they were taught to digitise Odia books on Odia Wikisource. Workshops have been conducted to train faculty, who in turn will teach students about typing more books on Wikisource. Nine faculty members and 45 students are chosen for this work in the first phase.

Earlier this year, fourteen books (13 in Oriya and one in English) pertaining to a range of subjects have been relicensed under Creative Commons License will be made available on Odia Wikisource. At present, three books have been digitised and proofread, and another is in the process of being digitised. KISS is also digitizing 11 books of Odia author Dr. Jagannath Mohanty that were relicensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0 earlier this year, due to CIS-A2K’s efforts. Pankajmala Sarangi, a Wikisource writer, who had digitised two books and has played a key role in getting approval for Odia Wikisource says, "I would be happy to contribute by typing more books on Odia so that they can be stored and available to all. We can take this to masses through social, print and audio & visual media and organizing meetings/discussions." Five modern Odia poetry books from Odia poet Bharat Majhi and four books including one encyclopedia from notable Odia children litterateur Ramakrushna Nanda have been relicensed under CC-by-SA 4.0 recently. These books will soon see their digital versions on Odia Wikisource.

CIS-A2K has been instrumental in identifying four new Wikisource contributors to help to digitise the Odia Bhagabata, an Odia classic compiled in the 14th century. They will join five other Wikimedians who have been contributing on a regular basis to Odia Wikipedia. Wikipedia and Wikisource contributors are excited about this development and this is reflected in the quotes given below.

“Odias around the globe will have access to a vast amount of old as well as new books and manuscripts online in the tip of their finger. Knowing more about the long and glorious history of Odisha will become easier,” says Mrutyunjaya Kar long time Wikimedian who proof-reads books on Odia Wikisource.

Saswat Kumar Swain, a Wikisource contributor says, “It is sad to see that there is not much information in Odia language even after it got the got classical status. This is a really nice initiative. I'd request all Odias to read Odia Wikisource and if possible contribute to make Odia Wikisource bigger & better.”

“As a contributor I find it is easier to edit in Wikisource than Wikipedia. I think common people will get more out of it than Wikipedia as the later is rather meant for people who need research type of article. The forgotten golden articles will surface to prove that old is gold,” says Dr. Subas Chandra Rout, Odia Wikisource contributor.

The project release took little more time because of various technical problems. User:MF-Warburg, admin of Wikisource who played a key role in helping to set the new wiki calmly tells the community, "glorious preparations take time" when Odia Wikimedian and Odia Wikisource's first admin Srikant Kedia pings him multiple times about the release of the project. Srikant, who has been active on Odia Wikipedia and done major work in connecting with the global community and fixing bugs says, "I speak Marwari at home as it is my mother-tongue, I studied in an English medium school as English is a common language worldwide and a need of today. And I am associated with Odia Wikiprojects as Odia is my janmabhumi (motherland) language. My great grandfather came to Odisha over 100 years ago and this language is very precious for me. It is my pleasure to promote Odisha and Odia language."

Preetinanda Roy, KISS's lecturer and coordinator of the KISS-Wikisource project feels that the students learn a lot during workshops and Wikisource write-a-thons. She is currently helping 8 of her colleagues at KISS to train 45 students to digitize books on Odia Wikisource.

Odia Wikisource offers a breath of fresh air for online readers who are eager to access and make available free open content in Odia.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/odia-wikisource-goes-live

Wikipedia can establish Tulu in a wider way

praskrishna — 2014-10-24T16:01:07Z

In his predential address after inaugurating the three-day workshop on ‘The use of internet for promotion of Tulu language,’ organised by Karnataka Tulu Sahitya Academy, Karnataka Tulu Sahitya Academy President Janki M Brahmavar opined that internet media, especially Wikipedia, can contribute to a large extent towards the promotion of Tulu language. The president said there was a need for the effective use of Unicode for the digital interpretation of Tulu.

This was published in Mangalore Today on October 17, 2014. Dr. U.B.Pavanaja gave his inputs.

Delivering a talk on the occasion, Centre for Internet and Society (Bangalore) Indian Languages Programme Coordinator and Wikipedia representative Dr U B Pavanaja said that Tulu Wikipedia is in the process of getting life. He said that minimal work has taken place in Tulu language and that too, is not up to the mark, to be considered for the inclusion of the language to the 8th schedule. There is a need for Unicode, which would enable the language to acquire wide recognition, though it positively qualifies as a classical language of ancient times.

There should at least be 500-600 articles in Wikipedia to consider it as live. At least 8-10 articles should be uploaded every month. He added that only eight people had updated their Tulu articles into Wikipedia, during previous year, when the workshop was held at Mangalore. At present the number has gone up to 320. Until March, the number of articles uploaded was 137. The government should work towards it. Dr Pavanaja added that Wikipedia is a free encyclopedia, and is in 287 languages across the world. Anyone who is interested can update his or her articles into the encyclopedia. There are nearly 6000 languages across the world. The people who avail the internet facilities at home can also work on some articles and upload their write ups into Wikipedia.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/news/mangalore-today-october-17-2014-wikipedia-can-establish-tulu-in-a-wider-way

Open access platform to save the Odia Indian language

subha — 2014-10-24T15:32:40Z

In February 2014, the Government of India declared the South Asian language Odia as the 6th classical language of India which is one among 22 scheduled languages of India and has a literary heritage of more than 5,000 years. There are documents for more than 3,500 years, and the rest are undocumented oral histories.

The article was published by Opensource.com on October 22, 2014.

The native Odia speakers became hopeful of getting a lot of language related projects implemented to grow the lineage of this long literary heritage and see the language used and spoken globally, not just in literature but in computer and mobile games, interactive computer applications and in other digital media—and to reach the masses as a communicative language.

So far, not many federal initiatives have been put into place, nor a single policy level change has been made, to implement a standard as simple as like Unicode for easy access of information. And, there are very few mobile apps that offer concise and easy to digest content. Overall, there is not much content online that is available in a standard format that is easy to search, access, and reproduce,

Wikisource is here to change that and is working to open up a whole new world of online resources for readers.

With more than 40 million native Odia speakers living in the Indian state of Odisha and its neighboring states and the diaspora in rest of the world—primarily living in countries like the US, UK, UAE, and many of the South and East Asian counties—far less content in the Odia language has been made available on the Internet. The highest is Odia Wikipedia, with 8441 articles created by October 2014. A bigger problem is that though there are a few websites with Unicode content, government portals do not have content in Unicode to make them searchable and reusable. A non-profit Srujanika, with support from two other institutions, has digitized around 740 books under the scope of the project: Open Access to Oriya Books (OAOB), most of which were published between 1850 and 1950. This remains the largest digital archive so far for the Odia language, yet all of the books are scanned PDFs, restricting searchability of the content.

Odia Wikisource is a project that aims for the digitization of rare books that are out of copyright. The project is even allowing authors and publishers to donate their copyrighted work by re-licensing under CC0 or CC BY-SA licenses. The goal is to bring about access to large volumes of books and manuscripts and create more Open Educational Resources (OERs). The single biggest advantage of the Wikisource project at-large is that it makes text for books available in Unicode standard, making it searchable on the web and allows readers to copy and use it elsewhere. Most other conventional archival systems lack this important feature.

Wikisource is run by a volunteers and communities who often retype or prepare the books by Optical Character Recognition (OCR), a technique that converts scanned images of books into text. Participate and contribute to Odia Wikisource by visiting or.wikisource.org, the project is open to all who want to help!

As a Wikimedia project, Odia Wikisource went through a thorough and long approval process for about 1 year and 9 months, as an active incubator project—first by the Language Committee and then by the Wikimedia Foundation's Board. During this incubation phase, the project has digitized three books completely and one partially—thanks to the individual contributors. An educational institution Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS) in collaboration with the Wikimedia funded Centre for Internet and Society's Access To Knowledge (CIS-A2K) are in the process of digitizing 9 books by the author Dr. Jagannath Mohanty that were re-licensed to CC BY-SA 3.0 earlier this year.

Four new Wikisource contributors joined the project in response to a tweet and a Facebook post by the author to digitize The Odia Bhagabata, classic literature compiled in 14th century. "Content that has already been typed in fonts of various non-Unicode based encoding, now they can be converted by (this) like it was done for The Odia Bhagabata, that was typed and available on the community hosted website Odia.org. New contributors did not face the problem of retyping,” says Manoj Sahukar, who along with the author designed a converter for reading text and transforming into Unicode for The Odia Bhagabata.

Questions for early contributors to Odia Wikisource

Subhashish Panigrahi (SP): You have been with Odia Wikisource since its inception. How you think it will help other Odias?
Mrutyunjaya Kar, a long time Wikimedian who proofreads the books on Odia Wikisource: Odias around the globe will have access to a vast amount of old as well as new books and manuscripts online in the tip of their finger. Knowing more about the long and glorious history of Odisha will become easier.

SP: Do you think any particular section of the society is going to be benefited by this?
Nasim Ali, the oldest active Odia Wikimedian and Wikisource writer: Books contain the gist of all human knowledge. The ease of access and spread of books are the markers of the intellectual status of a society. And in this e-age, Wikisource can be helpful by not just providing easy access to a plethora of books under free licenses but also aiding the spread of basic education in developing economies. Together with Wikisource and cheaper internet this could catalyze a Renaissance of 21st century.

SP: How does it feel to be one of the few contributors to digitize Odia Bhagabata? How do you want to get involved in future?
Nihar Kumar Dalai, a Wikisource writer: This is a proud opportunity for me to be a part of digitization of such old literature. I, at times, think if I could get involved with this full time!

SP: You have digitized almost two books, are the highest contributor to the project and also one of the main reasons for Odia Wikisource getting approved. What are your plans next to grow it and take to masses?
Pankajmala Sarangi, a Wikisource writer: I would be happy to contribute by typing more books on Odia so that they can be stored and available to all. We can take this to masses through social, print and audio & visual media and organizing meetings/discussions.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/open-source-subhashish-panigrahi-october-22-2014-open-access-platform-to-save-the-odia-indian-language

Letter to the Prime Minister on Indo-US Bilateral Relations on Intellectual Property

nehaa — 2014-11-03T14:58:26Z

This is a letter that many organizations sent to the Prime Minister. The Centre for Internet and Society was one of the signatories.

22 October 2014

To,

Shri. Narendra Modi
Hon’ble Prime Minister of India
South Block, Raisina Hill,
New Delhi-110011

Fax: 23019545

SUBJECT: US-India Bilateral Relations on Intellectual Property

Dear Prime Minister Modi ji,

We, the undersigned, wish to share with you some of our concerns on India’s position on intellectual property (IP), particularly in the context of bilateral relations between the United States of America and India. We gather from the US-India Joint Statement dated 30 September 2014 that the Indian Government

(a)greeing on the need to foster innovation in a manner that promotes economic growth and job creation…committed to establish an annual high-level Intellectual Property (IP) Working Group with appropriate decision-making and technical-level meetings as part of the Trade Policy Forum.

The necessity for setting up the joint Indo-US IP Working Group is not entirely clear. As the Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion (DIPP)‘s press release of 3 October 2014 mentions, there is already in operation an Indo-US Trade Policy Forum since 2010. Therefore, we request your Government to kindly make the specific purpose of this joint Working Group publicly known.

We wish to further submit that the grant of decision-making powers to the new joint Working Group could be at the risk of ingression of sovereign policy space. Bilateral arrangements should not have the power to supersede domestic democratic decision-making processes mandated by the Constitution of India. We appreciate that bilateral parleys at the political and diplomatic levels may be necessary in order to address threats of unilateral action by the US administration. But such bilateralism in the area of IP must be approached with an extremely high degree of caution.

We urge that the Government be particularly wary of higher IP standards (benefiting US corporations) that are typically demanded by the US administration and its trade negotiators in bilateral and plurilateral negotiations. The US demands clearly go beyond what the World Trade Organisation (WTO) asks for from its member countries. Several regional trade agreements or bilateral investment treaties either signed by or being negotiated by the US bear evidence to this trend. Any bilateral negotiation on IP between India and the US would definitely witness demands on India to provide for higher standards of IP protection that are not required of us by the WTO’s IP agreement - TRIPS.

It is important to note that the new bilateral arrangement between the United States Government and the Government of India is being undertaken against the backdrop of heightened US political interest in India’s IP regime, which has been spurred on by its business interests. Pharmaceutical and biotechnology MNCs backed by the US are the key actors on that front. India has earned phenomenal interest world over for its generic medicines -- a reputation that must be preserved. US should not decide our IP policies when it is a question of national interest and international solidarity. There have been intensified pressures on India; US putting India on its 2014 ‘Priority Watch List’ and the current Out-of-Cycle Review (OCR) of India’s IP regime being conducted by the US are recent examples of this. We fully support the position taken by Indian authorities to not go along with any such unilateral measures by the US Government. We insist that this stance of the Government of India be relentlessly maintained.

In case there is an intent to craft afresh our position on IP and its different dimensions, it should be pursued by a ‘National Working Group on IP’ working under the oversight of a Standing Committee of the Parliament of India. While formulating India’s positions on IP we trust that the Government of India will continue to withstand external pressures on this front. We urge the Government not to continue with the proposed annual forum on IP with the US, particularly as we do not have a matching domestic process.

The process begun under the DIPP to frame a national IP Policy, first needs to be completed independently along with public consultation. Many more stakeholders from amongst ‘ordinary’ peoples need to be included in the process; these include treatment activists, farmers groups, community organisations, etc. While there is no harm in having a policy statement, the policy should be consistent with the existing laws in our country and mindful of the future challenges, particularly for the generic medicines industry. While framing a national IP Policy afresh, it needs to be kept in mind that our current IP laws are already compliant with existing international laws and allied obligations. We strongly urge you not to amend India's IP statutes to reduce the flexibilities currently available to safeguard the public interest such as affordable medical products, right to food and the access to knowledge.

As you are aware, India’s IP rules and their enforcement also have trans-boundary implications. As an emerging global force, as well as a responsible member of the global community, through its IP strategy India is well positioned to also articulate the concerns of many Low and Middle Income countries. The legitimate space for discussions on global IP standards is the WTO’s TRIPS Council, and it is in this multilateral forum that issues of concern between different countries should be discussed. India ought to reach out to a much larger constituency, even beyond the 160 country governments represented in the WTO, through the promotion of IP-related policies that are humane and which foster people-centred and planet-sensitive ‘development’.

We the undersigned, working in different sectors, would also like to collectively reiterate that higher standards of IP protection will not necessarily translate into ‘economic growth and job creation’ in a country such as India. IP-related policy cannot be dealt with as a mere trade issue. Sectors that entail the provision of basic human needs, such as health, agriculture, biodiversity, education, etc., can be adversely impacted by higher standards of IP protection and the dilution of flexibilities (for example, those in our existing Patent Act). Public policy goals with respect to scientific endeavours, technology development and local innovations that offer more sustainable options for the future – such as climate-adaptive seeds and Indian Systems of Medicine, can also be severely challenged by inappropriate domestic IP strategies.

Given the multiple domestic concerns that our IP Policy must respond to, we press for your Government to kindly view it with a holistic perspective that it warrants, rather than the official approach being subsumed by the relatively narrow confines of trade and economic policy.

We earnestly entreat you to take a personal interest in this important matter.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

CONCERNED CITIZENS/GROUPS:

Shalini Bhutani, Legal Researcher & Policy Analyst
B L Das, Former Ambassador to GATT
Anand Grover, Director, Lawyers Collective
K M Gopakumar, Third World Network
Dinesh Abrol, National Working Group on Patent Laws
Prof. Jayati Ghosh, Jawaharlal Nehru University
Kalyani Menon-Sen, Feminist Activist & Coordinator, Campaign for Affordable Trastuzumab
S. Srinivasan, Low Cost Standard Therapeutics (LOCOST), Gujarat
Amit Sengupta, Jan Swasthya Abhiyan
Mira Shiva, Initiative for Health & Equity in Society and All India Drug Action Network
Biswajit Dhar, Professor CESP/SSS, Jawaharlal Nehru University
Sagari R Ramdas, Food Sovereignty Alliance - India
K. Pandu Dora, Adivasi Aikya Vedika
Kavitha Kuruganti, Alliance for Sustainable & Holistic Agriculture (ASHA)
Vikas Ahuja, President, The Delhi Network of Positive People
Loon Gangte, Regional Coordinator, ITPC-South Asia
Aruna Rodrigues, Sunray Harvesters
Suman Sahai, Gene Campaign
Wilfred Dcosta, Indian Social Action Forum (INSAF)
Surajit Mazumdar, Professor CESP/SSS, Jawaharlal Nehru University
Kanchi Kohli, Campaign for Conservation and Community Control over Biodiversity & Kalpavriksh
Kapil Shah, Jatan Trust, Gujarat & Organic Farming Association of India (OFAI)
S. Ashalatha on behalf of Rythu Swarajya Vedika, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh
Kavita Panjabi, Professor, Jadavpur University
Umendra Dutt, Kheti Virasat Mission, Punjab
Usha S., Thanal, Kerala
Aruna Burte, Feminist Researcher and cancer survivor
Nivedita Menon, Feminist Activist and Professor, Jawaharlal Nehru University
Gabriele Dietrich, National Alliance of People's Movements
Kannamma Raman, Associate Professor, Department of Civics and Politics, University of Mumbai
Jacob Nellithanam, Centre for indigenous Farming Systems, Chhattisgarh & Madhya Pradesh
Rajesh Krishnan, Coalition for a GM Free India
Rachna Arora from Public Awareness on GM Food (PAGMF)
Ashish Gupta, IFOAM Asia
Claude Alvares, Goa Foundation
M R Baiju, Democratic Alliance for Knowledge Freedom (DAKF), Kerala
Madhu Sarin, Forest rights researcher and policy analyst
P V Satheesh, Director, Deccan Development Society
C N Suresh Kumar, Co-Convenor, Millet Network of India (MINI)
C Jayasri, Coordinator, Southern Action on Genetic Engineering (SAGE)
A Giridhar Babu, Alliance for Food Sovereignty in South Asia (AFSSA)
Narsamma Masanagari, Media Coordinator, Community Media Trust
Bharat Mansata, Earthcare Books
T C James, former Director (IPRs), DIPP, Government of India
D. Narasimha Reddy, ICSSR National Fellow, CSD, Hyderabad
Mishi Choudhary, Executive Director, Software Freedom Law Centre (SFLC.IN)
K Ashok Rao, President, National Confederation of Officers Associations (NCOA)
B Ekbal, Kerala Sastra Sahithya Parishad
Gautam Mody, General Secretary New Trade Union Initiative
Sunil Abraham, Centre for Internet and Society (CIS)
Veena Johari, Lawyer and Legal Researcher
Subbiah Arunachalam, Science writer
Vandana Shiva, Director Navdanya Trust.
Manoj Pardeshi, General Secretary, National Coalition of People Living with HIV in India (NCPI+) and NMP+
Malini Aisola, Oxfam India
Manicandan, Forum Against FTAs
Afsar H. Jafri, Focus on the Global South
Forum against FTAs.

Cc:

Hon’ Minister of Agriculture
Hon’ Minister of Commerce and Industry
Hon’ Minister of External affairs
Hon’ Minister of Environment, Forests and Climate Change
Hon’ Minister of Human Resources Development
Hon’ Minister of Communications and Information Technology
Hon’ Minister of Science and Technology
Principal Secretary, PMO
Secretary, Department of Agriculture Research and Education
Secretary, ER& DPA , Ministry of External Affairs
Secretary, Department of Commerce
Secretary, Department of Communication and Information Technology
Secretary, Department of Environment, Forests and Climate Change
Secretary, Department of Higher Education
Secretary, Department of Industry Policy and Promotion
Secretary, Department of Science and Technology

For Further Communications:

Dinesh Abrol, Convener, National Working Group on Patent Laws (NWGPL), J 17, Second Floor, Lajpat Nagar 3, New Delhi 110 02.
Tel: 011-40521773, Email: dinesh.abrol@gmail.com

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/letter-to-prime-minister-on-indo-us-bilateral-relations-on-intellectual-property

Odia Littérateur Ramakrushna Nanda's 4 Books Now Available Under a Creative Commons License

subha — 2014-11-06T13:41:49Z

Children literature in Odia language went through an ennoblement after the intervention of Ramakrushna Nanda's writings.

His poetry “Ahe Dayamaya Biswa Bihari” has been sung in every school in Odisha. His work around Odia poetry, language and grammar, essays and encyclopaedia have been greatest resources for children for quite a few decades. CIS-A2K is honored to now bring four of his books under Creative Commons Share Alike (CC-by-SA 4.0) license:

Biswa Parihay (Encyclopaedia)
Lekhanira Pathasala (Grammar)
Bhabi Dekhantu (Compilation of essays)
Pausa Sandhyara Gapa (Compilation of stories)

The larger plans after this is to bring these books online on Odia Wikisource by scanning and digitizing them.

Video

Ramakrushna Nanda's son Prabhat Kumar Nanda and daughter-in-law Anasuya Nanda, speak about the journey of the children's magazine the “Sansar” and way forward for Odia Wikisource for today's generation.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/ramakrushna-nanda-four-books-under-cc-license

Pushing women scientists

praskrishna — 2014-10-21T15:44:09Z

Wikipedia edit-a-thon attempts to raise awareness of the contribution of Indian women to science.

The article by Renuka Phadnis was published in the Hindu on October 19, 2014. T. Vishnu Vardhan gave his inputs.

Ask anyone to name an Indian scientist and the answer is likely to be a man, and not a woman scientist. To let more people know about the unsung heroines of science in India, a workshop called the Ada Lovelace Edit-a-thon 2014 was held here recently. At least 15 participants added content about women scientists over two days to Wikipedia as the first step in bringing public awareness about them.

The edit-a-thon (a large number of people adding or modifying content on Wikipedia at once) concluded on October 14, which was Ada Lovelace Day, an international day to celebrate the achievements of women in science, technology and maths. The event was organised by BioScienceIndia Programme, a non-profit science outreach initiative, and Bangalore-based Centre for Internet and Society.

Participants added information about at least 40 women scientists. Information on 80 more would be added in a year’s time, said Nandini Rajamani, Co-director, BioScienceIndia Programme.

The aim, however, is to go beyond edit-a-thons, to examine issues that have not received the attention they deserve. Women scientists in India are not on par with men for several reasons (see info box) and the “leaky pipeline” theory is used to describe their decreasing visibility. Vishnu Vardhan, Director, Access to Knowledge team, CIS, said the aim is to motivate a new and younger generation of women scientists.

Karthik Ramaswamy, visiting scientist at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) and a participant in the edit-a-thon, said science in India has a ‘diversity problem’ with Indian women and minorities represented inadequately. “There are very few women scientists among faculty of science institutions because they have no role models. Hopefully, this (presence on Wikipedia) will provide them with role models,” he added.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/news/the-hindu-renuka-phadnis-october-19-2014-wikipedia-editathon-attempts-to-raise-awareness-of-the-contribution-of-indian-women-to-science

More Than 40 Million People Await the Launch of Odia Wikisource

subha — 2014-11-04T13:58:48Z

Speakers of Odia will soon have mountains of books to read online in their mother tongue, following the launch of the Odia Wikisource, which will make accessible many rare books that have entered the public domain.

The article by Subhashish Panigrahi was published in Global Voices on October 18, 2014 and thereafter mirrored on the Wikimedia Blog on October 21, 2014.

Authors and publishers are also invited to donate their copyrighted work, possibly bringing open access to large volumes of books and manuscripts, creating a vast archive of educational resources. And everything will be in Odia.

One of the biggest advantages of Wikisource is that all its books are available in Unicode, meaning that Google's search engine indexes the texts’ entirety, and readers are able to copy easily what they wish. (Most conventional archival systems lack this feature.) A volunteer community administers Wikisource. To upload a book's content, volunteers either retype the books word-for-word, or, when possible, use Optical Character Recognition (commonly known as “OCR“), which converts scanned images into editable text. Available at or.wikisource.org, Odia is Wikisource's eleventh Indic language.

There are more than 40 million native Odia speakers in the world. Most live in the Indian state of Odisha and its neighboring states, but there is a large diaspora in countries like the US, UK, UAE, and across South and East Asia. Despite being spoken by so many people, Odia's online presence is relatively small.

As of October 2014, Odia Wikipedia hosted 8,441 articles. The state government's websites have Odia-language content, naturally, but none of the text is in Unicode, making the materials invisible to search engines and difficult to share. Thanks to individual and organizational efforts, some Odia-language websites have recently emerged with Unicode content.

With support from the non-profit organization Pragati Utkal Sangha and the National Institute of Technology Rourkela, a Bhubaneswar-based outfit has digitized about 740 books through the Open Access to Oriya Books (OAOB) project. Most of these texts were published between 1850 and 1950. The OAOB project is the largest existing digital archive of Odia literature, but the archived books are only available as scanned PDFs, restricting readers’ ability to search within the texts.

As a Wikimedia project, Odia Wikisource underwent a long approval process, after running as an active incubator project for nearly two years. Both the Language Committee and the Wikimedia Foundation's Board reviewed and endorsed the project.

Odia Wikisource has already digitized and proofread three books entirely. In collaboration with the Wikimedia-funded Centre for Internet and Society‘s Access to Knowledge, the Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS) has partially digitized another book, as well. KISS is also busy digitizing another Nine books by Odia-language author Dr. Jagannath Mohanty that were relicensed to CC-BY-SA 3.0 earlier this year.

In response to posts on Twitter and Facebook, four new contributors recently joined Wikisource to help digitize “The Odia Bhagabata,” a literary classic compiled in the 14th century. “Content that have already been typed with fonts of non-Unicode encoding systems could be converted by converters which was the case of Odia Bhagabata. New contributors did not face the problem of retyping the text, as the book was already available on a website Odia.org and is out of copyright”, says Manoj Sahukar, who (along with yours truly) designed a converter that helped to transcribe “Bhagabata”.

Rising Voices contacted some of those whose efforts made this happen.

Mrutyunjaya Kar (MK), Long time Wikimedian who has proof-read the books on Odia Wikisource
Rising Voices (RV): Youre there with Odia Wikisource since its inception. How you think it will help other Odias?
MK: Odias around the globe will have access to a vast amount of old as well as new books and manuscripts online in the tip of their finger. Knowing more about the long and glorious history of Odisha will become easier.

Nihar Kumar Dalai (NKD), Wikisource writer
RV: How does it feel to be one of the few contributors to digitize Odia Bhagabata. How you want to get involved in future?
NKD: This is a proud opportunity for me to be a part of digitization of such old literature. I, at times, think if I could get involved with this full time!

Nasim Ali (NA), Oldest active Odia Wikimedian and Wikisource writer
RV: Do you think any particular section of the society is going to be benefited by this?
NA: Books contain the gist of all human knowledge. The ease of access and spread of books are the markers of the intellectual status of a society. And in this e-age Wikisource can be helpful by not just providing easy access to a plethora of books under free licenses but also aiding the spread of basic education in developing economies. Together with Wikisource and cheaper internet this could catalyze a Renaissance of 21st century.

Pankajmala Sarangi (PS), Wikisource writer
RV: You have digitized almost two books, are the highest contributor to the project and also one of the main reasons for Odia Wikisource getting approved. What are your plans next to grow it and take to masses?
PS: I would be happy to contribute by typing more books on Odia so that they can be stored and available to all. We can take this to masses through social, print and audio & visual media and organizing meetings/discussions.

Amir Aharoni (AA), Wikimedia Language Committee member and Software Engineer at the Language Engineering team at the Wikimedia Foundation
RV: What you feel Wikisource could do to a language like Odia with more than 40 million speakers?
AA: In schools in Odisha, are there lessons of Odia literature? If the answer is yes, then it can do a very simple thing – make these lessons more fun and help children learn more! Everybody says that in Kerala this worked very well with Malayalam literature.

Clearly, strong passions motivate Odia Wikisource's volunteers, like Nihar Kumar Dalai, who writes on Facebook:

Hindi and English are fine, but our native language it bit more special! Who of us does not now about the art, culture, noted personalities, tourist spots and festivals of Odisha? But if you search online about all of these then there is very little available. There comes a simple and easy solution Odia Wikipedia. Like Odia Wikipedia, Odia Wikisource is another great place and this is my small contribution to bring Odia Bhagabata on Odia Wikisource.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/global-voices-subhashish-panigrahi-october-18-2014-more-than-400-million-people-await-launch-of-odia-wikisource

Bharat Majhi Writings Now Available Under a Creative Commons License

subha — 2014-11-07T15:34:38Z

Before the advent of Odia Wikisource becoming live, Centre for Internet and Society's Access to Knowledge (CIS-A2K) got in touch with notable Odia author Bharat Majhi for bringing his writings on the Internet.

Dr. Sailen Routray, Director, Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS) (also an institutional partner of CIS-A2K) played a key role in initiating a dialog with Mr. Majhi. Five of his books are now available under Creative Commons Share Alike 4.0 (CC-by-SA 4.0) license:

Agadhu Duari
Saralarekhaa
Murtikaara
Mahanagara Padya
Highwayre Kuhudi

Bharat Majhi is a known name in Odia literary circle. His writings on societal structures in rural Odisha, the people, their life, aspiration and suffering have been critically acclaimed. These books also become the first Odia modern poetry books to be available under a CC-by-SA license and Mr. Majhi takes another leap of being the first Odia poet to release his literary work under CC-by-SA 4.0 license.

Video

In this video, Odia-language poet Bharat Majhi reciting a poem from his first book Agadhu Duari. He recently released 5 of his books under CC-by-SA 4.0 license by the efforts of Centre for Internet and Society's Access To Knowledge (CIS-A2K) and Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS).He also tells Subhashish Panigrahi about his dreams of poetry becoming a performing art coming true by it becoming more open. After other Odia author and poet Dr Jagannath Mohanty, Majhi is the first Odia poet to release poem online under CC-by-SA license and his poetry earn the title of the first Odia modern poetry under the same license.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/bharat-majhi-writings-now-available-under-cc-license

Ada Lovelace Edit-a-thon 2014

praskrishna — 2014-10-13T06:30:08Z

A Wikipedia edit-a-thon is being held at Urban Solace on October 14, 2014 from 10.00 a.m. to 4.00 p.m. The event is being organized by IndiaBioScience in partnership with the Centre for Internet and Society's Access to Knowledge (CIS-A2K) team. CIS-A2K will conduct the first three edit-a-thons.

In India, Science as a discipline is subject to many of the same gender issues as it is worldwide - women scientists are fewer in number than men, they occupy fewer positions of power, and face distinct issues by virtue of their gender and the accompanying societal pressures. Women Scientists in India also tend to be less visible than their male counterparts, and public awareness of Indian Women Scientists is low.

IndiaBioScience will be organising a series of public events to raise the profile of women scientists on one of the most-popular online encyclopaedias - Wikipedia. At these events, participants will be encouraged to create and complete profiles of Indian Women in Science.

The last of these events, on October 14 coincides with Ada Lovelace Day, an international day to celebrate the achievements of women in Science, Technology and Math.

To participate sign up below or click here (http://www.indiabioscience.org/content/women-science-wiki-edit-thon)

Lunch and snacks will be provided.

At the venue, the events will begin with a short, hands-on introduction to Wiki editing. Participants can then go on to pick the scientist they would like to work on. There will be an interaction session with a guest Woman Scientist around lunch, with a discussion of issues commonly faced by women in science. In the afternoon session, participants can continue working on the Wiki pages, with a break for tea. Participants are requested to bring their laptops. We have a few desktops available at Saturday's venue for those who cannot do so.

Online participants can find us via Google Hangout. Chat with us or dial in for interactions, questions, help or simply to socialize.

Speaker: Rohini Godbole

See the event page on Wikipedia.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/events/ada-lovelace-edit-a-thon-2014

Indian Women in Science Wiki edit-a-thon

praskrishna — 2014-10-13T06:17:56Z

A Wikipedia edit-a-thon is being held at the Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore on October 11, 2014 from 10.00 a.m. to 4.00 p.m. The event is being organized by IndiaBioScience in collaboration with the Centre for Internet and Society's Access to Knowledge team.

CIS-A2K will conduct the first three edit-a-thons.

To participate sign up below or click here (http://www.indiabioscience.org/content/women-science-wiki-edit-thon

Contact the IndiaBioScience Team for more details: www.indiabioscience.org & team@indiabioscience.org

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/events/india-women-in-science-wiki-edit-a-thon