Centre for Internet and Society

Open Street Map "Mapping Workshop"

sumandro — 2015-06-17T16:47:47Z

I conducted a workshop titled "OpenStreetMap Mapping Workshop" on Wednesday, May 13, 2015 at Phandeeyar. The workshop was attended by 20 enthusiasts. This involved organisations that work on resource issues, mostly on land grabbing, a start-up company that is planning to offer location-based local news feeds, a representative of MIDO, and an organisation that sells children’s books.

The participants had basic background knowledge of maps, which allowed us to directly get into the discussion of the OpenStreetMap project, Java OpenStreetMap Editor, and Field Papers. After the initial discussion, the participants got into three groups — one of which stayed indoors and used the online editor to contribute to OSM, one group went out to map the area using their phones (locations were saved on their phone and uploaded to OSM when they came back), and the last group went out to map the area using Field Papers. Connectivity problems made it challenging some of the groups to upload their data, but overall everyone took part in collecting geo-data and contributing it to OSM. The workshop simultaneously involved training trainers at Phandeeyar for future OSM workshops.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/phandeeyar-event-open-street-map-mapping-workshop

What is the Open Data Movement & Why Does it Matter?

sumandro — 2015-06-18T01:12:49Z

I gave a talk at this event organized by Phandeeyar on May 13, 2015 in Yangon. About 25 delegates attended the event.

My presentation focused on talking about the key qualities of open data, the process of opening up data, and its benefits. I mentioned various examples from across the world regarding usages of open data to describe and find patterns in how the various governmental processes function (elections, parliament, judiciary, and media outreach), and different topics related to flows of finance and resources (government budget and expenditure, international aids, financial information about corporates, allotment of oil concessions, and global investments in land). The discussion following the presentation focused on questions of how privacy concerns can be protected while opening up data, how protecting the (human) sources of published data is also important in sensitive situations (especially in the context of reporting incidents of hate speech and religious violence), how the capacity of grassroot organisations to collect, use, and share open data can be increased, and if open data can become a public resource during the upcoming national election later this year. At the end of the event, I was interviewed by a journalist of Myanmar Times on these topics.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/phandeeyar-event-what-is-open-data-movement-and-why-does-it-matter

Announcing Selected Researchers: Welfare, Gender, and Surveillance

sumandro — 2020-02-13T15:04:24Z

We published a Call for Researchers on January 10, 2020, to invite applications from researchers interested in writing a narrative essay that interrogates the modes of surveillance that people of LGBTHIAQ+ and gender non-conforming identities and sexual orientations are put under as they seek sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services in India. We received 29 applications from over 10 locations in India in response to the call, and are truly overwhelmed by and grateful for this interest and support. We eventually selected applications by 3 researchers that we felt aligned best with the specific objectives of the project. Please find below brief profile notes of the selected researchers.

Call for Researchers: URL

Kaushal Bodwal

Kaushal is persuing his MPhil in Sociology at Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi. He completed his Master's in Sociology at Centre for the Study of Social Systems, Jawaharlal Nehru University after getting a BSc honors degree in Biomedical Sciences from Delhi University. He is one of the founding members of Hasratein: a queer collective, New Delhi. He has been an active spokesperson for Queer and Trans Rights in India and have been on a number of panel discussion on Trans Act 2019 in various campuses. He has also delivered a lecture series on Colonialism and Medicine in Ambedkar University, Kashmiri Gate, Delhi. His areas of interest are Sociology of medicine, gender and medicine, sexuality, religion and biomedical science, intersex studies.

Queerness as disease – a continuing narrative in 21st century India, Kafila, 27 August 2019

What it means to be queer under a regime bent on remaking India on its own ideological terms, Firstpost, 17 January 2020

Rosamma Thomas

Rosamma has worked both as a reporter and as an editor of news reports with newspapers. She currently writes reports for NGOs while also undertaking freelance reporting assignments. She is based in Pune.

India's mining state steps up fight to rein in killer silicosis, The Times of India, 29 June 2016

Doctor may have found early marker for silicosis, but who will fund him?, Newsclick, 18 July 2019

Asbestos poisoning: Raghunath Manwar’s fight for safer work conditions, Newsclick, 9 January 2020

Shreya Ila Anasuya

Shreya is a writer, editor, journalist and performance artist currently based in Calcutta. Her fiction explores the places where myth, memory, history and the performing arts meet. As a journalist, her work explores gender, sexuality, politics, culture and history. She has been published in The Wire, Caravan, Scroll, Mint Lounge, Deep Dives, GenderIT, Helter Skelter, and many more. She is the editor of the digital publication Skin Stories, housed at the non-profit Point of View. She is the writer and narrator of ‘Gul - a story in text, song and dance’ which has been performed in several cities in India. She was a Felix Scholar at SOAS, University of London, from where she has an MA in Anthropology. For a full portfolio, please click here or visit her website.

This project is led by Ambika Tandon, Aayush Rathi, and Sumandro Chattapadhyay at the Centre for Internet and Society, and is supported by a grant from Privacy International.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/announcing-selected-researchers-welfare-gender-and-surveillance

Life of a Tuple: National Register of Citizens (NRC) and the Reform of Citizen Identification Infrastructure in Assam

sumandro — 2023-04-27T16:54:24Z

We are proud to announce that a research grant from the Azim Premji University has enabled us to initiate a study of the updation process of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Assam, and the resultant reform of citizen identification infrastructure in India. The study is being led by Khetrimayum Monish and Ranjit Singh, along with Sumandro Chattapadhyay.

The research focuses on two specific aspects of the NRC update:

Challenges of legal citizenship: In this context, we will investigate the constitutional acts and provisions for making citizenship claims in India, the historical narratives of identity politics in Assam and its culmination in the exercise of updating the NRC.

Challenges of procedurally implementing the NRC update: Here, we plan to explore the subsequent design process of updating the register.

Starting with the first aspect of legally defining Indian citizenship, the project will document and discuss the various legal processes of defining the bureaucratic process of updating NRC that emerge along two sets of concerns at different levels of Indian government. First, at the state level, we will explore the socio-political tensions around illegal immigration from Bangladesh and the history of identity-based politics in Assam. Second, at the level of the central government, we plan to investigate the constitutional and legal rules and provisions that are used to define citizenship in India.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/life-of-a-tuple-nrc-assam-citizen-identification-infrastructure

Life of a Tuple - NRC in Assam

sumandro — 2018-01-22T10:50:54Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/life-of-a-tuple

Ranjit Singh - Photograph

sumandro — 2018-01-24T11:46:55Z

Ranjit Singh

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/home-images/ranjit-singh-photograph

#MappingDigitalLabour - Panel discussion on platform-work in Mumbai and New Delhi

sumandro — 2019-07-20T11:58:19Z

With the rise and popularity of app-based platforms such as Ola, Uber, Swiggy Zomato, and others, there are growing public conversation about regulation of such 'gig-work' platforms and the work conditions of people who work for them. The Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) invites you to a panel discussion on Friday, July 19 in our Bangalore office, where the researchers associated with the project will present preliminary findings, and ethical and methodological challenges of studying app-based platform-work in India. Panelists Anushree Gupta, Rajendra Jadhav, Sarah Zia and Simiran Lalvani, who have conducted field studies of ride-hailing and food-delivery work in Mumbai and New Delhi, will share their preliminary field insights along with reflections on what it meant to do such studies, how they went about studying gig-work, and challenges that arose in their work. The discussion will be moderated by Noopur Raval who co-led the project. We invite scholars, journalists, and all interested members of the public to join us for the event. Tea and snacks will be served at 5 pm.

This project is supported by research assistance from the Azim Premji University.

Download: Poster and Flyer

Session Recording: Video (YouTube)

Agenda

5:00 pm - Tea and snacks in the CIS lawn

5:30 pm - Introduction to the project (Sumandro)

5:40-6:20 pm - Reflections based on field studies by the speakers (Anushree, Rajendra, Sarah, and Simiran)

6:20-6:40 pm - Speakers' responses to questions posed by the moderator (speakers and Noopur)

6:40-7:15 pm - Open discussion (moderated by Noopur)

Speakers and Moderator

Anushree Gupta is a Research Associate at Tandem Research. She is interested in studying the embeddedness of technology in society, with a focus on technical workers. Her research interests include technology mediated work, digital technologies and labour sociology. Her masters thesis examined the structure and dissemination of training in vocational education institutes (ITIs). Anushree has worked professionally on software development projects, including game development and social media analytics. She holds an MA in Development Studies from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai and a B. Tech. (ICT) from DA-IICT, Gandhinagar.

Anushree studied dimensions of platform-work among taxi drivers in Mumbai for this project.

Rajendra Jadhav is working as a research consultant, research fellow, researcher and research mentor with various non government organisations and academic institute for last 12 years. Rajendra has worked with Tata Institute of Social Sciences Mumbai as a Research Officer, as Program Director for PUKAR’s Youth Research Fellowship Program, and with National Dalit Watch - NCDHR, New Delhi as a National Coordinator for Research and Advocacy. Rajendra has pursued MA in Media and Cultural Studies from Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai.

Rajendra studied dimensions of platform-work among food delivery persons in New Delhi for this project.

Sarah Zia is an education reporter working with Live Mint, and has previously worked with the Times of India and has undertaken an independent study of mobility and transport in Delhi (focusing on paratransit in Delhi and the Delhi Ring Railway). Sarah has pursued MA in Mass Communication from AJK Mass Communication Research Centre, Jamia Millia Islamia, Delhi.

Sarah studied dimensions of platform-work among taxi drivers in New Delhi for this project.

Simiran Lalvani is currently working as a Consultant at Microsoft Research on a Future of Work project. She has an MA in Development and Labour Studies from the Centre for Informal Sector and Labour Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi.

Simiran studied dimensions of platform-work among food delivery persons in Mumbai for this project.

Noopur Raval is a PhD researcher at the University of California Irvine where she studies issues of labor technology. She has also worked with the Wikimedia Foundation and Microsoft Research in the past. She is interested in questions of intersectionality, and is an avid consumer of popular culture and food.

Noopur is a co-principal investigator of this project (along with Sumandro).

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/platform-work-india-panel-discussion-20190719

Mapping Digital Labour in India

sumandro — 2019-07-20T15:22:01Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/mapping-digital-labour

Pallavi Bedi

sumandro — 2019-08-13T11:29:28Z

Pallavi Bedi

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/people/CIS_Pallavi.JPG

CIS_APU_DigitalLabour_PlatypusEssays_SL_01

sumandro — 2019-08-16T12:33:37Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/CIS_APU_DigitalLabour_PlatypusEssays_SL_01.jpg

NETmundial - Comparing Appearance of Fifty Most Frequent Words

sumandro — 2014-04-25T09:59:13Z

This set of analysis of the contributions submitted to NETmundial 2014 is part of the effort by the Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, India, to enable productive discussions of the critical internet governance issues at the meeting and elsewhere.

Image above: Comparing Absolute Appearance of Fifty Most Frequent Words

Image above: Comparing Relative Appearance of Fifty Most Frequent Words

Created by Sumandro using R.
Download the R code.
Download the data.

These heatmaps compare the appearance of fifty most frequently appearing words (for all 187 contributions) across the contributions made by different types of organisation. Click on them to see the larger images. Hit *escape* to come back to this page.

The first heatmap shows the absolute appearance of the words -- that is the total number of times each word appears in contributions by a type of organisation.

The second heatmap shows the relative appearance of the words -- that is the ratio of the word's appearance in contribution by a type of organisation divided by total number of contributions by that type of organisation.

The Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, India, is a non-profit research organization that works on policy issues relating to freedom of expression, privacy, accessibility for persons with disabilities, access to knowledge and IPR reform, and openness, and engages in academic research on digital natives and digital humanities. The analysis was done by Geetha Hariharan, Jyoti Pandey, and Sumandro Chattapadhyay, with data entry support from Chandrasekhar.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/net-mundial-comparing-appearance-of-fifty-most-frequent-words

NETmundial - Contributions by Types of Organisation

sumandro — 2014-04-25T09:57:11Z

This Sankey diagram shows all the countries/regions from where contributions have come in on the left side, and all the various types of organisations on the right side. Use the mouse cursor to hover over a country to see what proportion of the submissions from that country has come from which type of organisation, or hover over an organisation type to see what proportion of submission from such organisations have come in from which countries.

The height of the blue bars next to the country/region names and organisation types indicate at the respective proportions among all the contributions.

Certain submissions have been contributed by global organisations, such as Internet Society, ICANN and Commonwealth agencies. These submissions have been included in the 'Global' division in the above chart.

Created by Sumandro using Google Charts.
Google Terms of Use and Data Policy.
Download the data.

The visualisations are done by Sumandro Chattapadhyay, based on data compilation and analysis by Jyoti Pandey, and with data entry suport from Chandrasekhar.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/net-mundial-contributions-by-types-of-organisation

Tito Dutta

sumandro — 2018-08-21T06:14:01Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/Members/tito_dutta.jpg

Sailesh Patnaik

sumandro — 2018-08-21T06:35:18Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/Members/sailesh_patnaik.JPG

Pavan Santhosh

sumandro — 2018-08-21T06:55:41Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/Members/pavan_santhosh.jpg