It may seem incomprehensible to someone brought up in the information world, but governance training in India, and by inference governance practice, does not include the concept of accountability, and only in a few celebrated cases include responsibility.
In this scenario, one can debate, and one can bemoan, but the only answer going forward to is to participate in bringing about change. We have a weapon called RTI, and we have more weapons in the criminal procedure code. >From Indranil's description, the situation in iota (it doesn't seem to deserve capitalising) is worthy of a few choice suits. I cannot tell whether sufficient evidence is in hand to substantiate his account of the history, but if not, then RTI must be used to draw out that evidence, then file a suit for relief and compensation (punitive damages). Two kinds of lawyers can help: successful ones who don't mind the publicity but don't need the money, and trial winners who also take up pro bono cases in order to strengthen their reputations. Only with a bit of experience in hand can costs be assessed so that forthcoming cases can be taken forward without being forced to depend solely on pro bono qualifications. Most of us are quite unfamiliar with how this works. imho, petitions raise awareness, but for most situations, only the courts can bring relief. On Sat, Nov 26, 2011 at 2:07 PM, Indranil Das Gupta <[email protected]>wrote: > Mani, > > On Sat, Nov 26, 2011 at 1:25 AM, A. Mani <[email protected]> wrote: > >> On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 11:50 AM, Indranil Das Gupta <[email protected]> >> wrote: >> > On Thu, Nov 24, 2011 at 7:32 PM, A. Mani <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> >> >> Please Sign: >> >> >> >> >> >> >> http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/stop-shift-towards-closed-source-proprietary-software-i.html >> >> >> >> The text of the petition is >> >> ____________________ >> >> >> >> STOP SHIFT TOWARDS CLOSED SOURCE PROPRIETARY SOFTWARE IN E-GOVERNANCE >> >> AND EDUCATION, AND DECLARE A PRO-FOSS POLICY >> > >> > Where are details about the alleged shift in Education, I could find >> none in >> > the petition. >> > >> >> Actually people have already signed, so I cannot add much. >> I have added info about WB IOTA >> >> 1. WB IOTA has been virtually abandoned and no activities have >> happened under the present Govt . >> > > Abandoned? IOTA was a "orphan" from DAY 0. It suffered from an identity > crisis - it could not figure out if it was an autonomous registered > society, which according to their papers they were; or if they were merely > a wing of the IT Department, Govt of WB. The words were cleverly crafted - > an autonomous society under the aegis of Dept of IT, GoWB. IOTA's support > budget came from grant-in-aid from the Dept of IT. > > Now if they are / were an autonomous society, can one claim abandonment by > the GoWB? On the other hand, the life members of IOTA have either resigned > or filed their resignations or want to get out of it ASAP. So, who is > abandoning whom? In fact, the word on the street is that NASSCOM has been > approached to take over the reins of IOTA or mentor it otherwise as some > sort of open source incubator or some such. > > Except for 2 - 3 people on the board, no one ever used anything but > Windows and proprietary software. IOTA even bought proprietary software to > develop Flash based content for schools. Obviously such software needed > Windows to run on. This went on until, it was decided to use OpenOffice.org > Impress to build school content as presentations. > > Even at that point, there was ZERO understanding on copyright and such. > The content creators (direct employees of IOTA or outsourced > consultants/hires) would blithely copy copyrighted images trawled from > images.google.com and use these into "content" designated to be > distributed to the schools, without even any attribution. > > None of these content were ever released under any CC license. IOTA also > designed a college admission management software, using LAMP stack, which > was piloted at a couple of colleges in Kolkata. Again the code never saw > any public release. Also, IIRC, during the 2011 edition of Kolkata > International Bookfair, IOTA released a CD/DVD that carried on-board the > prop. Adobe Flash Player. > > In essence, IOTA operated its "free software business" with a proprietary > mindset. In the nearly 4 years of its existence there was much it could > have achieved, but in the end, it achieved precious little. > > Same is the case with the WBPCB example. Over the years, it had enough > time and opportunity to release its EMIS file-tracking and management > software as a free software project on Sourceforge.net or any other hoster, > and create a benchmark tool for Indian e-gov space. Never did and possibly > never will. If anything, the software will die a dusty death if the alleged > policy shift enforces a shift to MSFT. > > And for all these activities and more, public funds - money that you and I > paid as taxes, were used. Where is that accountability? > > What has realistically happened is that the present administration has > simply in several cases asked for audited balance sheets / progress reports > and proposed future plans before further disbursements if any. > > cheers, > -idg > > > -- > Indranil Das Gupta > > Phone : +91-98300-20971 > Blog : http://indradg.randomink.org/blog > IRC : indradg on irc://irc.freenode.net > Twitter : indradg > > -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-==-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- > Please exchange editable Office documents only in ODF Format. No other > format is acceptable. Support Open Standards. > > For a free editor supporting ODF, please visit LibreOffice - > http://www.documentfoundation.org > > > _______________________________________________ > network mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.fosscom.in/listinfo.cgi/network-fosscom.in > > -- Vickram Fool On The Hill <http://communicall.wordpress.com>
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