Open Source Software Could Save Rs 8,254 Cr in Edu Alone'
Neha Alawadhi
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New Delhi:
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Born Free An IIM-Bangalore study has estimated that schools and other such institutions could save 8,254 crore by adopting free and open source software
Use of free and open source software could help India save more than Rs8,300 crore in government expenses on education and police only , says a new study , vindicating the Centre's move to promote such software as part of its Digital India initiative.Schools and other institutions could save an estimated Rs 8,254 crore by adopting free and open source software (FOSS) while police departments could save about ` . 51.20 crore, said a study led by Rahul De, Hewlett-Packard Chair Professor at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore.
The study , `Economic Impact of Free and Open Source Software Usage in Government' looked at education and police departments across seven states between October 2013 and April 2014. Findings can be applied to most areas of egovernance, which rely heavily on platforms and service delivery , De said.
The study findings show that use of open source software leads to huge cost savings and promotes a do-it-yourself attitude towards technology amongst officials.
“Both in the education and police departments, where vendors have a strong presence, the decision makers have low familiarity with FOSS and confidence in expressing their preference, as one respondent stated he was worried about recommending FOSS, but had no fears about recommending proprietary software,“ De said.
The government over the past few months has adopted policies supporting development, procurement and sharing of open source software for government applications and services, so that projects under Digital India “ensure efficiency , transparency and reliability of such services at affordable costs“.
De said the government can also contribute to the “Make in India“ initiative if it uses open source licences and shares the source code with the larger open source community . “For example, the e-Office mission mode project can be shared with the larger open source community . India is an IT superpower; smaller countries which do not have IT power will be looking at some of the software we build and learn from our experience,“ he said.
De, along with Lewin Sivamalai and Ravi A Rao of IIM-Bangalore, and independent researchers Sharmila Chakravarty , Supriya Dey and Uma Bharath, used desk research, right to information applications and field visits to collect data from sources for the study that covered Karnataka, Kerala, Goa, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Assam and Jharkhand, where the departments studied had either considered or were actively using FOSS.
Among the education departments, Kerala was found to be using FOSS most effectively for schools and benefited in the form of massive cost savings, inculcation of a do-it yourself culture amongst teachers and students and active participation in the education process. All other states were found to be dependent on proprietary software such as Microsoft Windows.
“State governments are encouraged to rely on vendors, either through the build-ownoperate-transfer (BOOT) model or as system integrators, in order to meet their implemen tation deadlines,“ the study said. “This approach discourages the do-it-yourself approach as this would require more time and resources. This dependence on vendors leads to a choice of proprietary software even though FOSS is a viable choice,“ it noted.
States using proprietary software ended up paying huge costs for licences, training and maintenance.
For police departments, researchers looked at government's Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and System (CCTNS), which aims to connect 20,000 police stations and crime record bureaus using real time data. The project was approved in 2009 in the aftermath of the Mumbai terror attacks, with an initial outlay of . 2,000 crore. The core system ` for CCTNS has been developed by Wipro in two versions--Java, which is open source, and .Net, which was proprietary before Microsoft open sourced it earlier this year.
The study found none of the states used a complete open source system for CCTNS.“There were no strong benefits or costs of using either stack for the CCTNS. Costs were being paid by the Centre, hence the issue was not strong,“ it said.
In Jharkhand, however, there were some committed FOSS enthusiasts in the department who built additional products using such software, it said.
The typical cost for maintaining a single desktop computer that uses Windows at police department was found to be over . 12,000 a year, which included ` an average of Rs 6,400 for Windows desktop licence, ` . 5,200 for a Microsoft Office licence, and `. 455 for anti-virus.
“Respondents in the police department expressed their inability to state why FOSS had or had not been chosen,“ the study said. “They said that the decision had been made by `higher-ups' and they were following that. This is in contrast to the CCTNS policy that states that software choice is decided by the state implementers along with the SI,“ it said.
The study , `Economic Impact of Free and Open Source Software Usage in Government' looked at education and police departments across seven states between October 2013 and April 2014. Findings can be applied to most areas of egovernance, which rely heavily on platforms and service delivery , De said.
The study findings show that use of open source software leads to huge cost savings and promotes a do-it-yourself attitude towards technology amongst officials.
“Both in the education and police departments, where vendors have a strong presence, the decision makers have low familiarity with FOSS and confidence in expressing their preference, as one respondent stated he was worried about recommending FOSS, but had no fears about recommending proprietary software,“ De said.
The government over the past few months has adopted policies supporting development, procurement and sharing of open source software for government applications and services, so that projects under Digital India “ensure efficiency , transparency and reliability of such services at affordable costs“.
De said the government can also contribute to the “Make in India“ initiative if it uses open source licences and shares the source code with the larger open source community . “For example, the e-Office mission mode project can be shared with the larger open source community . India is an IT superpower; smaller countries which do not have IT power will be looking at some of the software we build and learn from our experience,“ he said.
De, along with Lewin Sivamalai and Ravi A Rao of IIM-Bangalore, and independent researchers Sharmila Chakravarty , Supriya Dey and Uma Bharath, used desk research, right to information applications and field visits to collect data from sources for the study that covered Karnataka, Kerala, Goa, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Assam and Jharkhand, where the departments studied had either considered or were actively using FOSS.
Among the education departments, Kerala was found to be using FOSS most effectively for schools and benefited in the form of massive cost savings, inculcation of a do-it yourself culture amongst teachers and students and active participation in the education process. All other states were found to be dependent on proprietary software such as Microsoft Windows.
“State governments are encouraged to rely on vendors, either through the build-ownoperate-transfer (BOOT) model or as system integrators, in order to meet their implemen tation deadlines,“ the study said. “This approach discourages the do-it-yourself approach as this would require more time and resources. This dependence on vendors leads to a choice of proprietary software even though FOSS is a viable choice,“ it noted.
States using proprietary software ended up paying huge costs for licences, training and maintenance.
For police departments, researchers looked at government's Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and System (CCTNS), which aims to connect 20,000 police stations and crime record bureaus using real time data. The project was approved in 2009 in the aftermath of the Mumbai terror attacks, with an initial outlay of . 2,000 crore. The core system ` for CCTNS has been developed by Wipro in two versions--Java, which is open source, and .Net, which was proprietary before Microsoft open sourced it earlier this year.
The study found none of the states used a complete open source system for CCTNS.“There were no strong benefits or costs of using either stack for the CCTNS. Costs were being paid by the Centre, hence the issue was not strong,“ it said.
In Jharkhand, however, there were some committed FOSS enthusiasts in the department who built additional products using such software, it said.
The typical cost for maintaining a single desktop computer that uses Windows at police department was found to be over . 12,000 a year, which included ` an average of Rs 6,400 for Windows desktop licence, ` . 5,200 for a Microsoft Office licence, and `. 455 for anti-virus.
“Respondents in the police department expressed their inability to state why FOSS had or had not been chosen,“ the study said. “They said that the decision had been made by `higher-ups' and they were following that. This is in contrast to the CCTNS policy that states that software choice is decided by the state implementers along with the SI,“ it said.
Source: Economic Times, 24-09-2015
