An informed choice

Sachin Pilot

Minister of State

(Independent charge) for corporate affairs,

Government of India

We live in the information age. Today, more information reaches us than at any other time in history. New information added to the internet in a month now amounts to more than the content of the Library of Congress in the United States, the largest library in the world. It is said that from the dawn of civilisation till 2003 humanity accumulated about five exabytes of data; today that much is added in two days! As per a recent forecast, by 2016, the global internet traffic will reach an annual rate of 1.3 zettabytes per year, in a layman’s term that amounts to roughly 38 million DVDs per hour. This means that more traffic will traverse the global network in 2016 than all prior “internet years” (1984-2012) combined. About 3.4 billion people will be online in 2016, half of whom will be in the Asia-Pacific region. Nineteen billion connections will dot the planet. Already, there are 919 million mobile subscribers in India, thanks to low tariffs resulting from intense competition.

Internet penetration in India at present is at 120 million users, but this is rapidly increasing. In 2016, India will have about 400 million people online, most of them on mobile devices. The reason why I am citing these statistics is because though these numbers are impressive, they would mean little unless they can be pressed to serve a larger social purpose.

From a public policy perspective, technology is what technology does. I believe we are at the threshold of a paradigm shift in our governance and delivery structures.

Technology has sown the present with seeds of opportunities that can be leveraged to reap not just economic but also social benefits. I believe now is the time when our efforts at providing UID numbers (aadhaar), direct cash transfers (of subsidy, pensions, scholarships) to the needy, broadband connectivity to panchayats, e-governance initiatives can be clubbed to truly take advantage of our nation’s inherent strengths in the space of information and communication technologies.

Such powerful connectivity would carry huge growth potential globally and nationally. Our economy would become ever-more tightly coupled with the world economy. A closer interplay between domestic and global economic forces would boost growth and create additional economic opportunities.

To the extent that electronic access through information and communication technologies (ICTs) becomes even more ubiquitous in India, it would also be the predominant platform for achieving inclusive growth. Our justifiably proud IT growth story is tempered by humbler achievements in tackling issues like poverty, malnutrition, illiteracy and illness. As a nation, we have to continuously marshal political will and resources to address these issues. Historically, these have taken the form of legislation, subsidies, reservations and financial support like pensions and scholarships for those with deprived backgrounds. The Right to Education and Right to Work are new entitlements with the potential to transform the lives of millions of our citizens. A food security Bill is also pending parliamentary approval.

These constitutional, legal and policy prescriptions converge upon individuals and families in terms of delivery of benefits and access to government services. Multiple agencies, levels of intermediation, and uneven monitoring have translated into gaps between allocations and outcomes. These gaps lead to squandering of precious resources and take the edge off many development efforts. This requires a large IT infrastructure reaching down to the village level and an identity for every citizen of India.

Our extensive telecom connectivity, our postal system with over 1.5 lakh post offices, and the proposed R20,000 crore National Optical Fibre Network for every panchayat plan to implement these physical resources. Our IT and telecom policies place digital inclusion at the heart of our sectoral efforts. The new electronics manufacturing policy seeks to ensure that our IT and telecom growth is significantly serviced by a homegrown hardware sector. The national e-governance plan has over 30 mission mode projects that address different Union and state services. Our statewide area networks and state data centres are already mostly in place. Large capacities also exist in the private sector.

The other part, of assigning a unique identity to every citizen of India, is being addressed through the aadhaar project, which aims to provide biometric identification for everyone. Over 210 million aadhaar cards have already been issued. When the exercise is complete, even the most deprived Indian can aspire to having a driving licence, a passport, and a host of government and private services. She can open a bank account, access credit, buy insurance, and receive her entitlements, pensions etc directly. A physician in Delhi can access the vaccination status of a tribal woman residing in the most interior and rural parts of our states and see if she was properly tracked during her pregnancy and childbirth, has received her cash and non- cash benefits, and so on.

The system will become more efficient, transparent, and accountable, at a fraction of the existing cost. This will enable a more targeted and dynamic deployment of the government’s efforts and would ensure the roughly R3 lakh crore we have earmarked for our social sector agenda reaches the ones who are in the most need of this help.

Sachin Pilot is minister of state (independent charge) for corporate affairs
The views expressed by the author are personal

Source | Hindustan Times | 29 October 2012
http://www.hindustantimes.com/News-Feed/ColumnsOthers/An-informed-choice/Article1-951435.aspx

E-Publishing and Indian Authors: A Study about awareness, attitude, and practices.

Mohamed Musthafa. K

Abstract

When the computer and electronic media are used for scholarly communication of any intellectual output, it is called electronic publishing. The present study is an attempt to find authors’ attitude and experience in electronic publishing of their scholarly research in India. The study was carried out by using a standardized questionnaire administered among 264 authors and out of these 256 questionnaires (96.96%), were selected for analysis and constitutes the population sample. The result shows that people in their middle age is more active in e-publishing activities. Among the participants 36.67 percent had published in electronic journals at least once in the last three years.  Minimum publishing gap and fast dissemination of research are the main reasons for preferring electronic publishing. The most often reported time between the submission and publication was three to six months (42.96%). Maximum number of authors (73%) participated in the survey use e-mail as medium to submit their manuscripts to the publisher and 92 percent (n=231) showed willingness to publish again in electronic journals.  Proper awareness and training should be given to the young researchers and scientists to encourage electronic publishing.

Keywords: E-Publishing, Electronic Publishing, Scholarly Communication, Open Access Publishing, Authors, India

MANLIBNET International Conference, IIM, Indore. 11-13 October, 2012

Online Scholarly Publishing in India: Initiatives and Practices

Dr. Naushad Ali PM

&

Mohamed Musthafa. K

Abstract

Electronic publishing has gained momentum during the last two decades around the world. I­n India electronic scholarly publishing started in late 1990s. Some academic and research institutions as well as commercial publishers started publishing research online. Indian Academy of Sciences, INSA, Indian Medlars Centre, MedKnow Publishers, Indianjournal.com, and Kamla Raj Enterprises were first to start e-publishing in the country. Later on many higher education institutions like IISc and research organizations such as DRDO started online scholarly publishing. E-journal, open archives and institutional repositories are popularly being used to put the intellectual output online in the academic institutions.  More than 50% of online journals published in India are open access. DOAJ has listed 373 journals from India, most of them are related to bio-medical subjects. DOAR listed 76 Indian institutional repositories (IR) and 53 IRs under 46 organizations in OpenROAR. Lack of training and lack of awareness about the e-publishing technologies are some of the obstacles to start online publishing in many institutes.  This paper studies various initiatives as well as experiences of different agencies in electronic publishing in India. Questionnaire and interview methods have been used to conduct the study.

Keywords: Electronic publishing, online publishing, academy, research, India

Published in KELPRO Bulletin, 19 June 2012

Role of Libraries in Online Scholarly Communication

Mohamed Musthafa. K

 

ABSTRACT

Introducing the electronic publishing and briefly describes the growth and development of scholarly electronic publishing around the world. Further, defining the open access publishing, asserts that it is the best solution for libraries to overcome the ‘serial crisis’. Author argues that libraries are the most suitable place for co-ordinating and undertaking the scholarly publishing activities in the academic institutions like universities in an electronic environment. The paper present some examples of best practices of library based electronic publishing at various universities at different parts of the world.

Key words: E-Publishing, Scholarly Communication, Open Access Publishing, Academies

Library Based E-Publishing.

A new service for Open Access Monographs: the Directory of Open Access Books.

OAPEN is pleased to announce a new service for Open Access monographs: the Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB). DOAB will provide a searchable index to peer-reviewed monographs and edited volumes published under an Open Access business model, with links to the full texts of the publications at the publisher’s website or repository. The beta version of the service will contain publications of a selected number of academic publishers. The beta version will be made public early spring 2012.

 The primary aim of DOAB is to increase discoverability of Open Access books. Academic publishers will be invited to provide the metadata of their Open Access books to the DOAB. Metadata will be harvestable in order to maximize dissemination, visibility and impact. Aggregators can integrate the records in their commercial services and libraries can integrate the directory into their online catalogues, thereby helping scholars, students and the general public to discover the books. The directory will be open to all academic publishers and should contain as many books as possible, provided that these books are peer reviewed and published in Open Access. DOAB will determine requirements for publishers to qualify as Open Access academic book publishers and will maintain a certification procedure.

A number of academic publishers have already expressed their interest in taking part in the further development of the service; among them are members of the OAPEN Library such as Amsterdam University Press and Göttingen University Press, and other well-known Open Access publishers such as Open Book Publishers, Open Humanities Press, MPublishing and Athabasca University Press. OpenEdition, a portal dedicated to electronic resources in the humanities (www.openedition.org), will also take part in the beta phase of DOAB.

DOAB will be launched by the OAPEN Foundation. The idea for DOAB has been developed with Lars Bjørnshauge and Salam Baker Shanawa (director of SemperTool), who were also responsible for the development of the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ). Both will be involved in the further development of DOAB.

OAPEN will manage the service and approach publishers to provide the metadata of their Open Access books. OAPEN (Open Access Publishing in European Networks, www.oapen.org) started in 2008 as an EU-funded project coordinated by Amsterdam University Press. The OAPEN Foundation is an international initiative dedicated to Open Access monograph publishing, based at the National Library in The Hague. OAPEN develops Open Access models for books and works with academic publishers and research institutes to build a collection of Open Access books through the OAPEN Library. OAPEN is currently involved in two pilot projects in the Netherlands and the UK experimenting with Open Access monograph publishing.

SemperTool will develop and maintain the service. SemperTool (www.sempertool.dk) is a software development company specializing in building digital library technologies, as well as providing hosting and consulting services. Salam Baker Shanawa, director of SemperTool, was in charge of development of DOAJ while employed at Lund University, and for the past two years SemperTool has been responsible for further development and maintenance of DOAJ.  SemperTool offers a range of reliable and cost-effective software solutions for digital libraries, and serves more than 100 universities in Europe, Africa and the Middle East.

Lars Bjørnshauge will be involved in the further development of DOAB and its business model. Lars founded and managed DOAJ during his service as Director of Libraries at Lund University, Sweden. Currently Lars is SPARC’s Director of European Library relations and Senior Advisor to the National Library of Sweden.

For more information, please contact Eelco Ferwerda, director of the OAPEN Foundation, e.ferwerda@oapen.org, +31(0)629565168.

ResearchGate: the professional network for scientists and researchers an ideal fit to Indian society

Currently in India there are discussions of imposing restrictions on social networking sites. Even educational institutions don’t encourage the use of such platforms. But there are many advantages to connecting with other people, especially in the sciences. Imagine members of a social network who are trying to identify a microbe and are not tagging a picture from a random party. ResearchGate is a professional network for scientists, to share their recent scientific work and discuss it with experts around the world. In Topics, members can discuss problems they face in the lab. According to Dr. Rajiv Gupta, a lecturer at the Harvard Medical School and MIT, “There are the Facebook-type social networking sites, but they have been sort of populated by teenagers. There is nothing there that is specific to doing research.” On ResearchGate, researchers can Follow their favorite scientist and they can read their publications and ask relevant scientific questions. Dr. Ijad Madisch, an alumni of Harvard Medical school and founder of ResearchGate, says that he came up with the idea for ResearchGate when he was stuck with a problem in his subject and could not find any answers. Within three years, the Network has grown to more than 1.3 million members from 123 countries.

What is the most exciting part for science enthusiasts and for educational institutes? The product is magnificently tailored to the researchers. The members have access to 45,000,000 abstracts and 350,000 publications, recommendations for conferences, related researchers and jobs – all simply by creating a profile. The profile is like a research curriculum vitae, which also includes publications. According to a New York Times article, Dr. Rajiv Gupta uses ResearchGate for his class notes. “There is so much activity online that he doesn’t have to answer the questions himself because someone else already has. The beauty of ResearchGate, he said, “is that the members are all there for a common purpose of advancing scientific research”. India continues to grow in the fields of science and technology. ResearchGate is the space for Indian scientists to become a part of this movement.