Centre for Internet and Society

Using the Wikimedia sphere for the revitalization of small and underrepresented languages in India

subodh — 2024-02-10T04:35:45Z

This report explores opportunities within the Wikimedia movement and projects to help revitalise small and underrepresented languages in India and provide recommendations to CIS’s Access to Knowledge team in furthering this effort. The report is mainly based on a roundtable conversation on Digital Access in Bhubaneswar with a diverse range of backgrounds and professions, including independent researchers, representatives from non-profit organizations, retired government officials, Wikimedia contributors (both Odia and Santali), ecological activists, directors of research institutes, consultants, and journalists. This was organized by the Access to Knowledge team of CIS in collaboration with Vasundhara, Bhubaneswar.

This strategic note discusses a broad program idea of offering barrier-free open access to resources in various underrepresented languages in India.

Languages spoken in the Republic of India belong to several language families, the major ones being the Indo-Aryan languages spoken by 78.05% of Indians and the Dravidian languages spoken by 19.64% of Indians. Languages spoken by the remaining 2.31% of the population belong to the Austroasiatic, Sino–Tibetan, Tai–Kadai, and a few other minor language families and isolates. According to the People's Linguistic Survey of India, India has the second highest number of languages (780), after Papua New Guinea (840). Ethnologue lists a lower number of 456.

The UNESCO endangerment classification is as follows:

Vulnerable: most children speak the language, but it may be restricted to certain domains (e.g., home)
Definitely endangered: children no longer learn the language as a 'mother tongue' in the home
Severely endangered: language is spoken by grandparents and older generations; while the parent generation may understand it, they do not speak it to children or among themselves
Critically endangered: the youngest speakers are grandparents and older, and they speak the language partially and infrequently
Extinct: there are no speakers left

North-East India is home to more than 200 languages, out of which 82 are listed as Vulnerable, 63 as Definitely Endangered, 6 as Severely Endangered, 46 as Critically Endangered and 6 as Extinct (The Guardian Dataset). Arunachal Pradesh is the state with the highest number of languages, with as many as 66 languages spoken there, while West Bengal has the highest number of scripts, nine, and around 38 languages.

The state of Odisha has 62 Scheduled Tribes who speak as many as 74 dialects. Their ethos, ideology, worldview, value orientations and cultural heritage are rich and varied. Odisha has the unique distinction of having 93 different Scheduled Caste communities spread over 30 districts and 314 blocks of the state having different dialects. Apart from the languages of the North-East and the state of Odisha, there are several other languages all over India that deserve better representation on the Internet. While a handful of these languages enjoy status and visibility as official languages of the states and thereby hold some currency as widely spoken languages in their linguistic territories, there are many more languages that do not have speakers counting beyond a few hundred. Examples include the Bellari language (Spoken in Karnataka by 1000 speakers), the Toda language (Spoken in Tamil Nadu by 1600 speakers) and the Naiki language (Spoken in Maharashtra by 1500 speakers). What these languages do share in common with the languages of the North-East mentioned earlier is that they all lack free and open source knowledge and data.

Some of these languages are the official languages of the states and are widely spoken in this region. On the other hand, some of the languages have a few hundred native speakers. However, irrespective of the size of the native population or official status of the language, they all lack free and open source knowledge & data.

These languages show a range of marked cross-linguistic features which pose several interesting questions to Linguistic theories and speech processing research. Moreover, the close geographical proximity of these languages makes them vulnerable to changes in multiple linguistic levels, making these languages an excellent resource to study language change. Despite this, these languages severely lack digital preservation. One of the major reasons that contribute to the lack of resources is the difficulty in human access to some of the areas in these regions. Moreover, with English and Hindi being used as a lingua franca in these regions, the actual number of speakers proficient in their native language is much fewer than the number shown in the census reports. This makes it more important than ever to initiate a preservation process which does not primarily depend on fieldwork while also increasing the presence of the language in the digital sphere.

As language technologies advance and more sophisticated tools are built using Artificial Intelligence, the divide between low resource languages and others is likely to get even larger as a common prerequisite of these advanced systems is the existence of a large amount of digital data. Low resource languages are at a risk of being left behind.

Research on these languages by researchers are mostly conducted by collecting data personally, which causes a huge hindrance to the research process, as most of it remains as a private collection or published in closed journals. Moreover, data collection through fieldwork is particularly challenging in this region due to the restricted access to most of the disturbed areas.

The goal of this program is to facilitate the study of these languages by making existing resources discoverable and building open-source structured datasets and tools using the Wikimedia sphere to enrich the language research landscape of small and underrepresented Indian languages.

Role of CIS-A2K

To design and commission relevant research studies in collaboration with language communities to define the premises of the program. The plan is to work with languages which are being written in single or multiple scripts in the pilot phase.
To develop strategies regarding the integration of language datasets with Wikimedia projects
Skill building of volunteers and community leaders in Wikimedia projects
Structure of local knowledge to be compiled for contribution
To identify the specific Wiki projects such as Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons, Wikidata, Lingua Libre etc to build the archives of these languages
Designing outreach and knowledge dissemination processes
To develop partnerships with other academic, social, cultural and research institutions in the language sector for the sustainability of the project
Material support - Sound recorders, microphones, hard discs, laptop, scanner, internet hardware
Financial support - Remuneration of intern/fellow, internet data recharge

Specific objectives

Empowering the communities by enhancing digital literacy and connecting them with the world of knowledge and people outside.
Revitalizing/enriching the languages by increasing their use, coverage and depth using technological interventions.
Creating an ecosystem for developing language learning resources and tools; particularly, in the context of the New Education Policy.
Enabling scholars and researchers to overcome the challenge of finding appropriate data and expanding the knowledge on these languages.
By using the Wikimedia sphere, the infrastructural and technological support is secured, so that these languages are able to function in the digital world.

It is important to realise that these objectives can introduce new dynamics into other spheres of activity, such as education and the development of language.

Methodology

Our target languages broadly belong to two sets:

Languages which are primarily spoken in various states of India and have some or no digital presence on the internet.
Endangered languages which have extremely limited or no digital presence.

Survey of ongoing work

Several individuals and institutions are working on languages across the globe. There are significant initiatives in India also to revitalise the small languages in the digital sphere. Some of these are listed in the reference section at the end. An exhaustive survey of all such efforts will be done to map the present status as well as a listing of stakeholders. The target languages for A2K’s future work and the potential collaborators will also be identified through these exercises.

Digital Dictionary Making

A dictionary is a vital resource for any language learning. The idea of collaborative dictionaries using platforms like Wiktionary or Wikidata Lexemes eliminates the need for expert lexicographers and terminologists and rather follows the method in which the users enter data as new entries, definitions, and so on, and the same is reviewed by editors, once published. An offline e-dictionary application using this dataset could be developed to overcome the problem of sparse internet connectivity where the user is only expected to download & install the application once and use the dictionary offline at any moment.

Data Acquisition Strategies

Leveraging Crowdsourcing using LinguaLibre for the creation of Speech CorporaGiven the scarcity of text and speech corpora for these low-resource languages, the main potential source for dataset creation is by crowdsourcing.
Using Optical Character Recognition techniques -

The digitisation of texts in the public domain would be done and made available freely by uploading them on Wikimedia projects. The digital copy will be made machine-readable using Optical Character Recognition (OCR).

Processing the acquired data

Preprocess
Processing Speech Corpora
Processing Bilingual Parallel text Corpora

Housing datasets

Wiki Commons for media files
Wikidata for Lexemes
Wikisource for texts

Capacity Building workshops

Promoting the language among the young speakers of the community, since they are the future of the language and if it survives, it will belong to them.

Help language speakers possess up-to-date digital competencies and feel confident about them to actively participate in the digital world and increase content in their own native language.

Promoting contributions on platforms like Storyweaver, Pratham Books, Eklavya etc.

Promote the upskilling of native speakers and other disseminators

Facilitate knowledge exchange through participatory mechanisms both virtually and face-to-face.

The potential communities would be introduced to Incubator for building new Wikimedia projects

Educational development

Applying Open access philosophy to advance language pedagogy.

Develop language learning resources and tools, particularly, in the context of the New Education Policy.

References

Wikipedia articles
SCSTRTI, Odisha - https://www.scstrti.in/index.php/resources/mle-initiative/bilingual-dictionaries
Most populous languages of Odisha - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Languages_of_Odisha.svg
People’s Linguistic Survey of India - https://www.peopleslinguisticsurvey.org/
The state and fate of linguistic diversity and inclusion in the NLP world - https://aclanthology.org/2020.acl-main.560/
Bhasha India - https://www.microsoft.com/en-in/bhashaindia
Omniglot - https://www.omniglot.com/index.htm
Bharatavani - https://bharatavani.in/
Storyweaver - https://storyweaver.org.in/
Dimasa Thairili - https://www.dimasathairili.com/
SIL International - https://www.sil.org/
Ethnologue - https://www.ethnologue.com/
Global Recordings Network - https://globalrecordings.net/en/
Glottolog - https://glottolog.org/
Endangered Languages Project - https://endangeredlanguages.com/

This is a report by Subodh Kulkarni with editorial oversight and support by Tanveer Hasan and Soni Wadhwa. Click to download the PDF here.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/using-wikimedia-sphere-for-revitalization-of-small-and-underrepresented-languages-in-india

Underrepresented Languages and Wikimedia Projects

subodh — 2024-02-10T02:43:06Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/files/underrepresented-languages-and-wikimedia-projects.pdf

Exploring Knowledge Repositories on Water Resources in India

subodh — 2022-10-21T13:23:24Z

This research study explores knowledge repositories on water resources in India, with a focus on how the digital transition has impacted the process of creation & access to these resources and possible collaborations to build open digital repositories around water. The research was undertaken by Subodh Kulkarni, with editorial inputs by Puthiya Purayil Sneha, and Chiara Furtado. This is part of a series of short-term studies undertaken by the CIS-A2K team in 2021–2022.

Read this report on Wikimedia Meta-Wiki here.

Introduction

Water is the most precious natural resource for the existence of all living organisms on earth. As human beings have not treated it respectfully in recent years, there are increasing challenges with accessibility and availability of water across large parts of the world today. In India, the groundwater levels are depleting at an alarming rate due to over exploitation^.[1] The quality of surface water reserves is degenerating due to pollution caused by discharge of wastewater, sewage and untreated industrial effluents.^[2] The condition of rivers is getting worse due to illegal and unregulated use of these resources across India. Due to damming almost all the rivers flow for only 8-10 months in a year. Above all, the pollution caused due to solid wastes and effluents have destroyed living organisms and aquatic life. Therefore most of the rivers in India are called ‘dying rivers’.^[3] There have been several discussions and debates happening around this degradation of rivers, especially in the last decade.^[4]

Efforts by various organisations are afoot to document the state of affairs, spread awareness and undertake activities on the ground with community participation. Citizen-led efforts have also been instrumental in strengthening several water conservation efforts in India. It is seen that these peoples’ movements have been further strengthened due to empowerment through enhanced awareness of these issues around conservation, and better access to knowledge on the subject, especially through scientific studies.

CIS-A2K has initiated Project Jalbodh in 2017 in collaboration with a few organisations to generate water related content. During one of the ‘River dialogues’, a CIS-A2K member was invited to introduce Wikimedia projects to the organisations working on water resources. In the discussions, it was revealed that there is negligible content about rivers, water pollution, floods, irrigation system etc. in Wikimedia projects. Following this, an analysis of content on these subjects on Marathi, Hindi & English Wikipedia and media on Wikimedia Commons was undertaken. The need to develop structured categorisation of content was also felt. As the organisations are trying their best to disseminate knowledge about water issues, they realised the potential of Wikimedia projects due to the high level of searchable content available on these platforms which can be accessed by the general public. In keeping with these objectives, over the last two years, various workshops were conducted with organisations working at the grassroots to develop the structure of articles, categorisation and re-licensing of source material on these topics across various Wikimedia projects. Tarun Bharat Sangh is leading this process, and has uploaded 90 books & reports on Wikimedia Commons under free licences, and created articles on rivers in Marathi, Hindi and English Wikipedia projects.

During these content generation events it was realised that the organisations are working closely with communities which are conversant mostly with local or regional Indian languages only. The availability and access to water related resources in these languages is therefore an important issue. The communities are in need of simple, accessible and ready to use content in various forms. They also require a platform on which they can document/archive their water conservation efforts for other communities to take lessons and motivation from these projects.

Research Questions

This study was framed by the following questions:

How has the digital transition impacted the process of creation and access to water related resources in India.
What are possible collaborations and processes to build open digital repositories around water, with special reference to rivers.

Methods

The study adopted a qualitative approach, with the method comprising online/offline, semi-structured interviews with organisations working in the water resources sector. Based on desk research and conversations with existing partners in the sector, a long list of organisations was developed.(See Annexure I). Further, eight organisations were shortlisted for interviews based on their experience and impact of work in the water conservation sector. Due to various constraints, eventually interviews with three organisations were completed. The interview questionnaire focused on the nature, objective and scope of the offline and online resources available, human resources involved, language aspects, documentation practices, methods of dissemination, utility, accessibility, training value of the material, intellectual property rights (IPR) policies and public outreach efforts. These interviews were conducted online and in-person and recorded with consent from the participants, along with a clear explanation on the objectives of the study and the data collection. As mentioned above, there were a few constraints with the research process and methods adopted, as well as external factors. These included restrictions on travel and in-person meetings due to the COVID 19 pandemic, and challenges with online platforms. Some of the organisations were not comfortable with online or telephonic interviews and insisted upon physical interactions. The online interviews were less effective with the organisations as they were unaware about the free & open knowledge platforms like Wikimedia, Internet Archive etc. In addition to this, introductory sessions were conducted to give them a background to the work of the programme and context of the study. A general challenge here was also logistical issues related to scheduling conversations etc. given that personnel were located across different departments.

Description of Organisations Interviewed

Advanced Centre for Water Resources Development and Management [ACWADAM]'

ACWADAM is an organisation dedicated to establish a groundwater management agenda in India. It is a premier education and action research institution engaged in developing and disseminating knowledge on groundwater management. It is also involved in facilitation of projects on groundwater management through action research programmes, training and policy advocacy, with a collaborative, participatory approach. ACWADAM's mission is to facilitate groundwater management programmes in partnership with various organisations spread across the country. Over the years, it has developed expertise on aquifer-based groundwater management based on the science of hydrogeology.

Action for Agricultural Renewal in Maharashtra [AFARM]

AFARM was founded in 1969 as an apex Institution to coordinate programmes of voluntary organisations engaged in providing drinking water and agricultural extension services to villages in drought affected Maharashtra. It is one of the pioneering networking organisations in the country working in the areas of sustainable agriculture, irrigation, disaster relief and drinking water resource management. It acts as a platform for several civil society organisations for the promotion of sustainable and equitable development. The emphasis is on capacity building of organisations through action research, advocacy and field projects at grassroots. AFARM is providing support and consultancy at the policy level.

BAIF Development Research Foundation [BAIF]

BAIF was established on the strong foundation of Gandhian values with the aim to improve quality of life through development research and capacity building. BAIF’s vision is to build a self-reliant rural society assured of food security, safe drinking water, good health, gender equity, low child mortality, literacy, high moral values and clean environment. It is striving towards the mission to create opportunities of gainful self-employment for the rural and tribal families with a focus on disadvantaged sections, ensuring sustainable livelihood, healthy environment, better quality of life and good human values. BAIF believes in field research, effective use of local resources, extension of appropriate technologies and upgradation of skills and capabilities with community participation.

Observations

Availability of digital datasets on water resource projects: Many organisations in the sector rely on online information and databases on sites such as – Census of India, IMD, Google Earth, Bhuvan, CGWB, GSDA, MRSAC, Bhumi Abhilekh, Survey of India, India Water Portal, Agriculture Department, Irrigation Department, Forest Department, Maharain etc. Many of the global datasets on water resources and related topics such as agriculture, population, topography, forestry, climate change etc. are also in the public domain. However, the updating of data is not done regularly. For example, we have to refer to census data for 2011 even in 2022. Many of the datasets are also at a macro level, providing very little granular data. The water resource projects mostly need micro level data which is collected through on-ground surveys.

Effectiveness of digital platforms, and challenges with internet coverage: Organisations have found the use of digital platforms and tools effective for quick exchange of common training modules, process videos, drawings and manuals, as part of their water resource projects. The digital format has also been very effective for dissemination of advisories, alerts etc. through smartphones, which have enabled better access to information on gadgets quickly. However, two-way communication is necessary when timely solutions to queries of the farmers are to be provided, and that has been difficult to set up in a sustained manner through a digital format.
Many organisations in the sector also engage in capacity-building efforts for staff, volunteers and communities. When building these communities and mobilising them for action, the process needs spontaneous feedback, live conversations, reading the expressions and actual interactions with each other. All these things are completely missing from virtual interactions. These organisational processes and capacity-building efforts were grossly hampered during the pandemic due to a reliance on online meetings alone.
There are still challenges of internet connectivity in rural and remote areas where the communities are involved in water management projects. The consistency of bandwidth is a major issue when it comes to streaming of audio-visual content, uploading of content, online workshops, etc.

Lack of documentation skills, and challenges with language: Most of the documents used in water resources related projects are technical in nature. The technical team invests more time in the implementation, hence the time and skills required for documentation are limited. This gap between technical skills and documentation skills is challenging. There are ample structures, technological methods, apps etc. for collecting the data but at the same time, the resources for data collection or structured data development are not sufficiently provided. There are also several language-related challenges at the field level. Crucial parts of the training and awareness material need to be translated in the local languages as well.

Mobilisation and motivation for communities and wider public: The offline and online content is not very effective to mobilise or motivate the people involved in action at the field level in water conservation efforts. The organisers are exploring all the modes of communication and content available, but there is no alternative for human leadership.
Some organisations like Paani Foundation have beautifully captured the success stories of these efforts in dramatic short films. These films inspire the public temporarily, but the content can not be used often. Also, the production costs of such content are high resulting in very few options for wider outreach to engage a general audience.

Negligible content about water sector in public domain or Wikimedia projects in local languages: All the organisations agree upon the lack of searchable content on water related topics on the internet and in the public domain through projects like Wikimedia. The activists looking for solutions on some technical issues, the community searching for good projects in other parts of India or the planners looking for some structured databases on impact of projects, all of them get very little content on the internet. The local language content on water resources has almost negligible presence.

Need for a comprehensive portal giving information to stakeholders at different levels: The different stakeholders concerned with water resources seek information and data on various levels and diverse formats according to application and purpose. As of now, no such comprehensive platform in multiple languages exists which caters to these needs. The requirements include a wide range like, sample design of water conservation structures, contour maps of region, rainfall data, estimates of raw material, ground water aquifer maps, water pollution parameters, operation of dams, irrigation systems, water policies, water treaties, government notifications, etc. A well structured and categorised knowledge repository and database on water resources is the need of the hour. Such a knowledge base would strongly support the actions on the ground.

Recommendations

Developing a Process Documentation Strategy: The continuous changes in knowledge resources and data regarding various topics related to water resources need to be documented from time to time. The dynamic nature of water related issues requires a proactive process documentation strategy for the organisation as well as the citizen science groups in the society. The ideal example is the trajectory of the monsoon season in India every year and the rainfall in various agro-climatic regions. The watershed conservation projects, river rejuvenation programs, pollution control projects are long term processes with long term impacts. The journey of several years is painstaking, needs patience and struggles on the ground with constant motivational efforts. The persons directly engaged in these efforts may not be able to spend time on documentation of the many resources that are a result of these efforts. Hence, a solid process documentation strategy is required. The process documentation is also crucial for assessment of project impact on environment, livelihoods, economy, geography and people. There are also citizen movements which have been active for a long time, which are instrumental in giving birth to new laws, rules, guidelines, notifications, etc. The different milestones and turning points in these processes are to be documented in time. This documentation can guide the larger citizens’ movements to design their strategies and to resolve issues arising during the course of this work, and across different thematic areas as well.

Accessible datasets open for all in the public domain: There is an important need to compile the datasets on water resources developed by different agencies with people’s participation and government funding for the planning of public works or schemes. The open access to such reliable and factual datasets in the public domain serves the purpose of transparency and accountability of public infrastructure programmes. This facility for society would provide impetus to rigorous analysis, studies, research and innovative designing of public infrastructure. The processing and presentation of data in visual formats, including infographics can boost understanding, awareness, and logical thinking processes among enthusiasts who would like to engage with water conservation efforts. Different perspectives can emerge after relating and comparing datasets. The networking of agencies, organisations, experts and citizen forums would further develop complementary datasets. This synergy will definitely create a community data pool beneficial for everyone.

Digital and open access content development for capacity building of field level activists: Various organisations have developed training material for field level activists in different formats. Most of this is not online or digitised. Through networking efforts, the integration could be done to develop systematic modules for capacity building. The modules would be hosted as Open Educational Resources (OERs) on Wikimedia projects or other free knowledge platforms. The topic wise categories will make the selection easier. These categories can include local water source, rivers, waste water disposal, pollution, water based livelihoods, water conservation treatments etc. The format combining course work with some hands-on experiments is beneficial to facilitate the process of self-study, self-assessment and self-design. This online repository can be accessed by the field activists working on water resources anytime, anywhere when they need guidance to resolve issues or trouble-shooting on site.

Orientation of organisations towards free knowledge platforms and Wikimedia projects: Over the years, the organisations working in this sector have created valuable material for wider circulation to create awareness and empower communities. These resources have been used effectively and in a few locations for a certain period of time. The outreach and dissemination through integration of these resources will have more impact in the coming years if digital platforms are utilised efficiently. The basic orientation of the organisations regarding such free knowledge digital platforms, including copyright issues, Creative Commons licences, digitisation process and internet technologies is necessary to kick start this knowledge dissemination movement. Some pilot projects could be executed to demonstrate the potential of Wikimedia projects in database generation, documentation of case studies, audio-visual repositories and reference libraries.

References

"Groundwater". edugreen.teri.res.in. Retrieved 2022-09-28.
"‘Discharge of untreated industrial effluents, sewage major source of river pollution’". The Indian Express. 2018-12-21. Retrieved 2022-09-28.
Naresh Singaravelu & Harshita Mishra (6 June 2019). "Rivers in India: a reality check". https://www.thehindu.com/. The Hindu. Retrieved 28 Sep 2022.
"Living rivers, dying rivers: Everything you wanted to know about rivers in India | India Water Portal". www.indiawaterportal.org. Retrieved 2022-09-28.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/research-exploring-knowledge-repositories-on-water-resources-in-india

Digitisation of O Bharat, a bilingual biweekly published in Goa from 1912 to 1949

subodh — 2022-10-11T14:53:58Z

The digitization project of O Bharat, a historic biweekly published between 1912 to 1949 in Goa was completed through collaboration of different organizations. The trustees of Bharatkar Hegde Desai Trust initiated the project in collaboration with Marathi department of Goa University, Bhakti Dnyan Marg Sanstha and Goa Central Library. The Centre for Internet and Society's Access to Knowledge Programme facilitated the project with technical and financial assistance. Two local students scanned 12000 pages in 8 days. The year wise volumes of O Bharat are now freely available on Wikimedia Commons in the form of archive.


Above: Front page of O Bharat in Portuguese	Above: Front page of O Bharat in Marathi

Context

It all started like this. During the Wikimedia session at Goa University in October 2021, it was realised that there is very little documentation about the ‘Goa Liberation Struggle’ on Wikimedia projects. So, in the meeting Prof. Vinay Madgaonkar from the Marathi language department took the lead to develop a project around this theme.

The exhaustive list of freedom fighters, major incidents in history, the places related with struggle, monuments and memorials was prepared. The next day, to have a glimpse of the situation on ground, we toured a few places and monuments in South Goa. As we were shocked to see the sorry state of the memorials, we came across a monument of Govind Pundalik Hegde Desai known as Bharatkar (an editor of O Bharat), in a lush green forest near Quepem village. Being curious to know about the history of O Bharat publication, Prof. Vinay introduced us to the grandson of Bharatkar, Adv. Khagendra Desai who founded Bharatkar Hegde Desai Trust, non-profit organisation in Goa to archive the works of Bharatkar.

As both of us share the same vision, CIS-A2K partnered with Bharatkar Hegde Desai Trust, to relicense and digitise freedom fighter Bharatkar’s ‘O Bharat,’ a Marathi-Portuguese bilingual weekly, currently housed at Goa Central Public Library.

About the 36 Year Run of ‘O Bharat’ upto India’s Independence

Freedom fighter, social reformer and journalist 'Bharat'kar Govind Pundalik Hegde Desai, (7th Nov 1885 - 15th Aug 1949), started 'O Bharat' (in Portuguese) or 'Bharat' (in Marathi) on 6th November 1912. For 36 years thereafter, Bharatkar courageously protested the Portuguese occupation, relentlessly advocated radical and progressive social reforms and doggedly championed the cause of an independent and sovereign Indian Goa.

Partnerships

The partnerships with various stakeholders were developed after a series of discussions and official communications. The Bharatkar Hegde Desai Trust obtained official permissions from the State Government departments for the access of O Bharat volumes in the library. Goa Central Public Library provided access to the bound volumes of O Bharat and permission to scan them. Another local organisation, Bhakti Dnyan Marg Sanstha in association with Goa University Marathi Department identified few students for the digitisation.

Digitisation process and launch on Wikimedia Commons

The trustees of Bharatkar Hegde Desai Trust relicensed the two volumes of selected editorials published in 2018 and the whole O Bharat issues into CC-BY-SA 4.0. We conducted digitisation training with Prof. Vinay Madgaonkar and students, Shravani Parab and Shridhar Raut, from Goa University to scan 12000 pages in 8 days. The officials of Goa Central Public Library cooperated in access to original volumes and in the process of digitisation. The Chief Minister of Goa inaugurated the project on Wikimedia Commons on India’s 75th Independence day, 15 August 2022. The year wise volumes of ‘O Bharat’ are now freely accessible to anyone in the world at any time anywhere. The uploading of the volumes is in progress.

Media links

The event of launching digitised content on Wikimedia was very well received by the people in Goa. The researchers, students, readers and journalists will have this reference value content while exploring the history of Goa. Various national and local media published the news covering all the aspects of this archive. The links are given below -

This was originally published on Wikimedia Blog in September 2022

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/digitisation-of-o-bharat

Digitisation of O Bharat, a bilingual biweekly published in Goa from 1912 to 1949

subodh — 2022-10-11T13:11:15Z

Context

About the 36 Year Run of ‘O Bharat’ upto India’s Independence

Partnerships

Digitisation process and launch on Wikimedia Commons

Media links

This was originally published on Wikimedia Blog in September 2022

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/digitisation-o-bharat

Re-licensing Sessions with Authors and Organisations

subodh — 2019-08-05T16:12:42Z

In collaboration with Marathi community, CIS-A2K is getting connected with various authors and organisations willing to re-license their content under CC-By-SA. A2K is facilitating the OTRS process Commons for re-licensing as well as digitisation of the content. The team of trained Wikimedians at Vigyan Ashram, Pabal, District Pune has taken the responsibility of digitising the books and further uploads in Wikimedia projects.

See the information posted on Wikipedia page here

In July, CIS-A2K facilitated the OTRS process of two organisations. Jnana Prabodhini and Saptahik Vivek Hindustan Prakashan Sanstha have released their 6 books and 8 volumes of encyclopedias respectively in CC-By-SA. As the organisations have solely published these books by sponsoring the writers, editors and designers, the authorised signatory of the organisation has to complete the OTRS process. The simple 'How to do' step by step manual was developed to facilitate this process. This process will be replicated by other organisations in near future. These books are valuable & reliable references in Marathi literature.

CIS-A2K conducted three sessions with authors also. In the field of rural development in Maharashtra, thoughts of Late S. G. Majgaonkar are highly regarded. His son Dhananjay Majgaonkar who holds the copyright for his books, completed the OTRS process and released 3 books in CC-By-SA. The books are now on Commons as well as Wikisource project.

Content donation sessions were conducted with Ila Dalwai, daughter of social reformer & writer Late Hamid Dalwai, thinker & writer Hari Narake and grand daughter of Marathi thinker & writer Late Narahar Kurundkar. These persons handed over the books to CIS-A2K for further process. The digitisation of the books has been started at Vigyan Ashram, Pabal.

The links of books uploaded on Commons are given below.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-july-31-2019-re-licensing-sessions-with-authors-and-organisations

Wikimedia Workshop on Rivers under Project Jalbodh

subodh — 2019-08-05T15:28:41Z

The Indian National Trust for Art & Heritage Pune Chapter is working with various organisations to preserve the natural heritage places like rivers in Pune district of Maharashtra, India. After the presentation of 'Project Jalbodh' by CIS-A2K in River Dialogue organised by INTACH in April 2018, several organisations shown keen interest in collaboration.

Open knowledge creation workshops were organised at four places by different organisations working on river issues. To sustain these efforts and mobilise the larger community to build knowledge on rivers, INTACH has decided to collaborate with CIS-A2K to develop long-term plan. This was the first workshop to develop structure of the project, decide the stakeholders and follow-up action plan for the future. The two day workshop was conducted on 29 & 30 July at INTACH office in Pune. Total 20 participants from seven organisations actively contributed to Wikimedia projects.

Background

As the water crisis and state of rivers is worsening day by day, the citizen's initiatives are taking more efforts to spread knowledge about it. Centre for Internet & Society representative actively participated in the River Dialogue organised by INTACH (Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage) and SANDRP (South Asian Network of Dams, Rivers and People) on 20–21 April 2018 to introduce the potential of Wikimedia projects to organisations working across Maharashtra state. After this orientation, a follow-up plan is prepared with Prof. Madhav Gadgil in which various groups have expressed their readiness to start content building on water & rivers. Jeevit Nadi organisation took first initiative on 28 May 2018 to train team of activists in open knowledge and Wikimedia Projects. Total 15 activists and researchers from Jeevit Nadi, EcoUniv, Jal Biradari (Tarun Bharat Sangh), Ecological Society, Sagarmitra organisations participated in this workshop.

In the second iteration on 25 July 2018, five participants presented their work, the database and the resources with them. These include photographs, videos, training material and data collected on site. They also worked on category tree and structure of article on river. The media available in the repository were sorted and analysed for uploading. This team has started preparing the database of local issues, maps of rivers and heritage places on the banks for uploading in respective categories.

The third iteration for building content on rivers in Sangli district was organised on 7 December 2018 by Jal Biradari & Tarun Bharat Sangh organisation. In this one day workshop, 11 activists working in Agrani river basin participated. They were trained in basics of Wikipedia editing and uploading on Commons. They worked on category tree of Agrani river basin and structure of articles on water related structures.

The fourth national level iteration was conducted between 22–25 December 2018 at Tarun Bharat Sangh, Bhikampura, Alwar district, Rajasthan for activists of Jal Jan Jodo Abhiyan from eight states. The 30 participants were trained in this four day workshop. They started contributing in various languages.

In collaboration with CIS-A2K, INTACH Pune Chapter has taken initiative to organise two day workshop to build knowledge on rivers in Pune district with various organisations.

Objectives

Many organisations and communities are working for more than 10 years in water sector in an organised way. They have built cumulative knowledge through action and research with an objective to disseminate it to the masses. Hence the 'Project Jalbodh' is being evolved to integrate this approach with the Wikimedia projects for mutually beneficial impact.Knowledge is to be presented in different forms, aspects and in appealing way. The interests and attention of the seeker should be taken into account. Therefore in many areas, the text is to be blended with media, data, graphs, maps etc to give holistic sense of knowledge. The Wikimedia projects can be explored to get this integration.

Facilitators

Supriya Goturkar-Mahabaleshwarkar, Co-convenor & Coordinator, INTACH PUNE CHAPTER
Marathi Wikimedians - Aaryaa Joshi, Kalyani Kotkar

Event Details

Date : 29 & 30 July 2019
Time : 9.30 am to 5.30 pm
Place : Pune, Maharashtra, India
Venue : INTACH Pune office, Kirloskar compound, Erandwane, Pune
Participants :20

Day 1

Day one started with introductions by members of organisations - Jeevitnadi (Living River Foundation), Sajag Nagrik Manch, Parisar, Centre for Environment & Education, Jnana Prabodhini, Ecological Society and INTACH. Then workshop conveners Supriya & Subodh explained the background and objectives of the workshop. The concept of 'Project Jalbodh' was elaborated. The keynote address was given by Prof. Madhav Gadgil. He delivered upon the genesis of knowledge in human evolution and need of open knowledge for healthy development of the society. He also discussed the integration of citizen science and Wikimedia projects. The brainstorming on mobilisation of community was done after this address with valuable inputs from Prof. Gadgil.

Introduction to major Wikimedia projects was given in next session. The examples of river and water related content were taken for understanding the context. The agenda for the workshop and the details were finalised through discussion on needs. The participants then started with opening accounts on Wiki followed by basic editing skills and rules of Wikipedia & Commons. They searched for various articles, infoboxes, categories and media related to river available in Wiki projects. The extensive interaction on status of the existing content happened to arrive at gap finding and listing the same. From this thought process, the importance of developing structure for river articles was realised. Then various members with their vast experience collaboratively evolved the structure of article on river in Marathi Wikipedia. According to local context, relevant sections and sub-sections were designed. Separate project page defining this structure was created on Marathi Wikipedia under the Wiki Project Jalbodh. This was the crucial activity for the project. After this session, the organisations conducted the analysis of the content developed by them which is to be contributed in Wikimedia projects. The planning of next day was done in the last session.

Day 2

On the second day, the activity started with uploading images on Commons. Along with this, the encyclopedic content available with the organisations was discussed for giving references. The articles were created in the sandboxes by groups on similar themes. The content was created as per the manual of style. Various skills like advanced search options for finding online references, archiving of url's on Wayback machine of Internet Archive were also acquired by the participants. The relevant media repositories were also explored. The category tree for the rivers was also designed. The detailed discussions on building databases, maps and media with community involvement was conducted. In the final session, the roadmap for future activities was prepared. Three model articles on rivers - Mula, Mutha & Pavana - will be completed in the next two months. Follow-up workshops will be conducted bi-monthly which will be hosted by different organisations. The discussion on campaign - Wiki Loves River - developed enthusiasm among the members. The meeting on this theme will be organised in September to plan the campaign.

Read the full report on Wikipedia page

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-july-30-2019-wikimedia-workshop-on-rivers-under-project-jalbodh

Orientation programme, Wikipedia workshop & Action Plan meeting in PAH Solapur University

subodh — 2019-08-05T15:21:16Z

CIS-A2K representatives visited PAH Solapur University, Solapur (PAHSUS) to finalise the action plan and MoU for the year 2019-20.

The collaborative project was launched with orientation programme and Wikipedia workshop for the selected students and faculty on 18 & 19 July 2019. The detailed discussions with Vice Chancellor, Registrar, Head of the departments, faculty and administrative staff were held to finalise the terms of collaboration, operational framework and action plan for the academic year. The deliberations are given in the following sections.

Collaborative open knowledge creation by PAHSUS and CIS-A2K

The MoU was done because CIS and PAHSUS have found common cause in free and open knowledge generation and dissemination. This MoU stipulates the scope of collaboration between these two entities and terms and conditions of conducting the collaborative activities.

Terms of Collaboration

To promote content generation in Indian language, especially Marathi Wikimedia projects (projects such as Wikipedia, Wikisource, Wikimedia Commons, Wikidata etc. https://www.wikimedia.org/) among the institutions under University affiliation.
To organise awareness programs and training workshops to achieve this. For consistent and dedicated efforts, mechanism of subject experts and coordinators will be developed.
To integrate the academic assignments, projects etc. with knowledge building in Wikimedia projects e.g. Wikipedia, Wikisource, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons.
To facilitate content donation in the form of published thesis, University publications to free library - Wikisource. To write well referenced articles based on these research work.
To develop platform in University for outreach programs on Digital knowledge, Language & technologies, FOSS, Unicode etc. To involve other stakeholders in knowledge business like publishers, writers, printers, designers in these programs.
To take lead in accommodating open knowledge concepts, locally relevant content generation practices while designing the courses.

Operational Framework

A core team shall be constituted by representatives of this MoU for realization of the objectives of this MoU.
The core team shall prepare an action plan with specific goals for achieving the objectives of the proposal and the MoU. They shall take into consideration the academic, commercial and legal aspects of this co-operation. The action plan or work plan may be modified or improved during the academic year according to the needs-assessment of the students, and the core team’s analysis.
The proposed action plan shall be reviewed and approved by representatives of both parties.
The core team shall be supported and authorised by the University Administration to take all necessary actions to implement the action plan in an effective, speedy and dynamic manner.
Program expense sharing shall be decided on a case to case basis by the core team.

Some highlights of proposed action plan

Each department of PAHSUS will facilitate creation of 10 Wikipedia articles related to their course by the students. This activity will be taken up in first semester. The articles will be created on user sandbox or on Google Docs. After review, the articles will be moved to Wikipedia mainspace.
The projects on museum, library and archives will be taken up in the second semester by the groups of students. The photos and other media will be uploaded on Wikimedia Commons and other sister projects after analysing encyclopedic quality of these content.
PAHSUS will issue a circular for selected affiliated colleges in Maharashtra to participate actively in free knowledge creation and the Wikimedia movement. The technical support will be arranged by both the parties.
The digitisation of copyright free books in the library will be taken up under ‘Earn & Learn Scheme’. The books will be uploaded in free library - Wikisource.

Orientation Programme

The orientation programme on Wikimedia projects was conducted on 18 July for faculty and students from 4 departments. The objective was to give perspective of content generation in Wiki projects along with academics. Marathi Wikipedian Arvind Bagale shared his Wiki experiences in this session. Around 50 participants attended this session.

Wikipedia Workshop

The Wikipedia workshop for selected students of 3 departments and faculty was organised on 19 July 2019 in the Mass Communication department. Total 15 participants actively contributed to Wikipedia & Commons. Marathi Wikipedian Arvind Bagale facilitated the training process.

Media Coverage

News in Lokmat Newspaper

See the report on Wikipedia page

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-july-19-orientation-programme-wikipedia-workshop-and-action-plan-meeting-in-pah-solapur-university

Wikimedia Education SAARC Conference 2019

subodh — 2019-07-04T02:48:58Z

Christ University in association with the Centre for Internet & Society's Access to Knowledge team (CIS-A2K) organized a conference, from 20 - 22 June 2019, at Christ University, Bengaluru. Forty-nine Wikimedians from four countries (Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh, and India) participated in the event.

The meta report published on Wikimedia Blog can be accessed here.

CIS-A2K is working with various universities and educational institutions to develop content in Wikimedia projects. One such institutional partner, Christ (deemed to be university) has taken the initiative to organize Wikimedia Education SAARC conference in association with CIS-A2K and Wikipedia & Education User Group. The participants included one member from Sri Lanka, four members from Nepal, seven members from Bangladesh and 37 members from India. In all 14 language communities were represented.

The broad objectives of the conference were:

To know the nature of education programs being conducted.
To share the best practices.
Discuss the challenges like retention and quality.
Explore the methodologies to evaluate & measure the work being done.
Enhancing the community involvement in the education programmes.

The applications for participation and thematic submissions were invited from Wikimedians of SAARC countries. The selection committee comprised of representatives from Wikimedia Foundation and community conducted the scrutiny. The scholarships were provided to 49 selected participants. In all 12 submissions on diverse topics were received from different language communities. Wikimedia Foundation’s Partnerships & Global reach team member Praveen Das, Trust & Safety team member Neha Nair and advisor for this conference Tanveer Hasan were also present for some of the sessions during the conference.

The following report gives a summary of all the deliberations at the conference.

Day 1, 20 June 2019

The inaugural session was graced by chief guest Dr. Ramesh Sharma, an expert in open education and Associate Professor of Instructional Design at Ambedkar University Delhi along with Dr. Anil Pinto Registrar of Christ University who was instrumental in launching Wikipedia in education for the students. The other persons on the dais were Tito Dutta, Program Manager CIS-A2K, Dr. Mallika Krishnaswami, Dr. John Joseph Kennedy, and Dr. Sebastian K A.

In this session the speakers stressed upon the advancement of language, to adopt latest knowledge sharing technologies, innovation in education programmes and collaborations with multifaceted institutions to actualize new ideas. The journey of Christ University regarding the Wikimedia education program during the last six years was also elaborated.

The inaugural session was followed by a session on Code of Conduct and Friendly space policies by the Response Team of CIS-A2K. The objectives, diversity statement, general community guidelines, unacceptable behaviour and process of reporting described in CoC were discussed. To explain the motivation and hierarchy of Wikipedia in Education at Wikimedia movement the following sessions were conducted during the conference.

In the keynote address, Dr. Ramesh Sharma revealed many facets of Open Educational Resources (OER) in the field of academic courses, science, mathematics, music, multimedia etc. He shared many experiences of working with Open Education Resource University (OERU) and appealed for future collaborations. He also deliberated upon some wider topics like Government education policies, licenses and quality improvement framework for OERs. In a remote session with Nichole Saad, Senior Programme Manager (Wikipedia Education Programme) from Wikimedia Foundation, she explained the rationale behind the Education in Wikimedia projects and the execution process.

The session on Wikipedia & Education User Group focused on the global user group that supports the work around Wikimedia and Education in various capacities. One of the Board members of user group, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga gave an introduction to the user group, its background, vision, and objectives. Later the functioning of the group was also explained including the membership process and the governance. The three focus areas of the group were explained in detail — community, resources, and outreach. Later, the participants were briefed on various ways in which they can get involved with the group. These included joining the newly formed working groups for each focus area, taking up membership, and also attending the monthly open meetings held by the group, and share their stories to the broader community. The session ended with a brief upon areas where community members could seek the support of the group, such as mentorship, securing resources, advocacy, etc.

The participants were introduced to each other through their work. Session on sharing of various programmes being conducted, it’s learning, challenges and way ahead were very informative and stimulating. The participants from different language communities explained the present status of the education programmes being conducted with institutions. The challenges like lack of initiative, the paucity of resources, trust in Wikipedia and consistency were discussed collectively. New and innovative ideas that were not tried so far were also put forth by the members making it an interesting session.

The last session of the day one was group work on the theme - ' कल आज और कल ' : Past Present Future. The participants were divided into eight groups. Enthusiasm was very high during discussions on the past, present & future of education programmes with the community. The groups collectively worked on the poster presentations.

Day 2, 21 June 2019

The second day started with an interactive session on the topic - The interesting ways of Introducing Wikimedia projects (Wikidata, Wikisource, etc.) into classrooms. The participants shared their experiences with different entry point events other than Wikipedia. Many felt that Wikipedia is complicated to start with. The community also reacted strongly sometimes due to the quality of the articles. This discussion was followed by promoting planned growth process for bridging the gender gap.

The conference submissions on education projects were presented in two parallel tracks. According to interest, the members attended the various sessions. The highlights of the presentations are given below.

Goals of Wikimedia + Education: Content, Retention, Skills: The session started off by asking participants about why they do an education programme, and what else can we include as the goals for any EduWiki activity. Different approaches for achieving each of these goals, and how each of these goals affects the rest were discussed. This included a quick brainstorming on how communities should collaborate with the EduWiki activities so that it adds value to its goals. Eventually, the presenter along with the participants realized that retention of users should be prioritized over the other two goals to easily reach all the three goals. Caution points regarding assignments like copyvio, reliable references were also discussed. The scale of the activity and scoping student interest are also an important criterion.

Challenges of growing communities : Make Wikipedia trustworthy to educators: In this session, challenges before Bangla Wikipedia were discussed. There is a need to collaborate with institutions and capacity building of editors to improve the quality of articles.

Non-Conventional methods of knowledge expansion by programs involving Wikimedia and Education: The formal approaches like giving compulsory tasks for students will not work in the Wikimedia movement. We can expect better outcomes by adopting non-formal methods like digital skills development and team building through collaborative work.

Wikimedia Program Outreach Mentorship: Proper awareness and detailed planning of resources are the key aspects of outreach programmes.

School Wiki in Kerala: State government education department of Kerala has developed School Wiki with Wikimedians in Kerala. In all 15000 articles of schools have been created with their history, location details, alumni, maps, cultural activities, photos and creative works of students like stories, poems and paintings. The innovative project - Folk encyclopedia is also shaping up. The linkages with Malayalam Wikipedia are being established slowly. As the students are now aware of the Wiki environment, there are chances of getting good editors in future.

Wikipedia in School: State government of Tamil Nadu took the initiative to organise capacity building programme for teachers through the EDUSAT on a mass scale. This Wikipedia training started in 2016 and till now 40,000 teachers are trained. Due to this, teachers became active on Wikipedia.

Retaining Tulu Language and culture: the ways and means: Karavali Wikimedians user group is active in the coastal part of Southern Karnataka and Northern Kerala. It is focusing on the preservation of language and culture. They have started the first physical Wiki library with 650 books. Other innovative activities are ‘Karavali Wikimedians to Home’ and Text-Performance-Documentation and Reconstruction of rare Folk Performing art Sidda Vesha.

VVIT WikiConnect : A Year in review : The coordinators of Wikiclub presented the activities conducted in the last two years. The focus is on capacity building of active students, leadership development, quality of content and retention. According to the scoping of students’ interest, various events were conducted like Edit-a-thons, Photowalks, Wikidata workshop, 1lib1ref session, Wikimedia Strategy Salon, Mini Media Wiki training, Thematic workshops, etc. The user survey was also done to get the feedback of students.

Wikipedia Student Association at Alva's College Moodubidire: The regular Wiki activities have resulted in active Students’ Association at Alva’s College. The major activities are publishing of wall magazine - Wiki Suddi : Mundu and newspaper - Wiki Samachaara, Wikicamp and internship by Department of Journalism.

Wikipedia in Education at Christ University: The coordinator presented the journey of six years programme at Christ. The process of engaging students from day one to the last day of the second semester was explained. The students learn digital skills, language typing, writing articles on the topic of interest and respective stream. From writing in the sandbox, they even progress up to documenting case study on research related to Wikipedia. The structure of monitoring and evaluation systems within the department was elaborated. The community engagement aspect was also discussed in detail. The challenges and the preparations for the next curve of WEP Christ were presented.

In the last session of the day, groups presented their work through posters visualising ‘Past, Present & Future’ of the education programmes. The interaction and loud thinking provided many ideas to be taken further for implementation.

The second day ended with Cultural programme by Christ University students. The vibrant performances of music and dance were enjoyed by the participants.

Day 3, 22 June 2019

The day started with early morning ‘Bird Walk’ at the university campus with rich biodiversity. Seven enthusiasts joined this walk and captured images of 22 different species of birds which is documented on eBird portal.

The last day of the conference started with a remote presentation on OER by Wayne Macintosh (Director OER Foundation, and UNESCO - ICDE Chair in OER). Wayne started with an overview of demand for education vis-a-vis the infrastructure available in the global south. The fundamentals of OERs, OER Foundation and OER University were elaborated. He stressed the need to start at least two OER courses by every Indian University. They can join the OERu network for free to host the courses. The credit system for various micro courses was explained through examples. He also discussed the WikiEducator programme and appealed Wikimedians to join this evolving community as all courses run using media-wiki software. Regulatory issues for universities to adopt OER courses are to be looked into in Indian context. Dr Ramesh Sharma assured to facilitate in this matter.

The next session, ‘Strategy in Wikimedia and Education’ by Pavan Santhosh intended to help participants understand the importance brewing Strategy and figuring out a Big dream in their programs. This session started with demystifying the word strategy. With examples from the Wikimedia movement that participants can relate, the presenter explained how can a Big dream help prioritizing activities and programs. Later in an interactive part of the session, participants came up with ideas to run a strategy process in their programs and communities.

Lively group activity - ‘Revolving cafe’ happened after the strategy session. The activity was planned around five themes - Program and Events Dashboard, Wikidata, Communication & Blogging, GLAM in Education and Support structures (WMF grants and CIS Requests page). As the groups were small, the participants utilised this opportunity to clear doubts through one to one dialogue. The session was mutually beneficial for group leaders as well as participants.

After the cafe activity, Wikimedia Education Staff member Sailesh Patnaik deliberated upon the outreach and communications aspects. He stressed on using social media effectively and give publicity to innovative activities through newsletters. He also explained about upcoming Greenhouse pilot.

The last session, ‘Wikisource in education’ was conducted by Jayanta Nath. He explained how Wikisource activity is complementary to the qualitative growth of Wikipedia. The basics of Wikisource like licenses and workflow were discussed in detail. Various ways to combine the education programme with Wikisource were explored in interaction.

The conference closing ceremony was meaningful with spontaneous feedback from the participants.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-june-22-2019-wikimedia-education-saarc-conference-2019

MoU between PAH Solapur University & CIS-A2K

subodh — 2019-06-05T06:21:47Z

In 2019, the students completed assignments in the form of Wikipedia articles. Looking at the interest of students and knowledge creation process, other departments also expressed their willingness to adopt this methodology in academics. Vice Chancellor Dr. Mrunalini Fadnavis took initiative to conduct introductory meeting to discuss the larger collaboration with University courses. The department heads agreed on working in Wikipedia, Wikisource, Wikidata, Commons and other Wikimedia projects to enhance the skills of students. As a result, principle level MoU to accommodate Wiki programs in academics as policy for the next academic year was signed between University and Centre for Internet & Society (CIS-A2K) on 15th May at Solapur. On this occasion, Program Manager Tito Dutta was present to sign on behalf of CIS. From University, VC, Registrar, Prof. Ravindra Chincholkar- Coordinator and HoD's of 4 departments were present. The summary of MoU is given below:

Terms of Collaboration

To promote content generation in Wikimedia projects among the institutions under University affiliation. To organise awareness programs and training workshops to achieve this. For consistent and dedicated efforts, mechanism of subject experts and coordinators will be developed.
To integrate the academic assignments, projects etc. with knowledge building in Wikimedia projects e.g. Wikipedia, Wikisource, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons.
To facilitate content donation in the form of published thesis, University publications to free library - Wikisource. To write well referenced articles based on these research work.
To develop platform in University for outreach programs on Digital knowledge, Language & technologies, FOSS, Unicode etc. To involve other stakeholders in knowledge business like publishers, writers, printers, designers in these programs.
To take lead in accommodating open knowledge concepts, locally relevant content generation practices while designing the courses.
To promote content generation in Wikimedia projects among the institutions under University affiliation. To organise awareness programs and training workshops to achieve this. For consistent and dedicated efforts, mechanism of subject experts and coordinators will be developed.
To integrate the academic assignments, projects etc. with knowledge building in Wikimedia projects e.g. Wikipedia, Wikisource, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons.
To facilitate content donation in the form of published thesis, University publications to free library - Wikisource. To write well referenced articles based on these research work.
To develop platform in University for outreach programs on Digital knowledge, Language & technologies, FOSS, Unicode etc. To involve other stakeholders in knowledge business like publishers, writers, printers, designers in these programs.
To take lead in accommodating open knowledge concepts, locally relevant content generation practices while designing the courses.

Plan of Execution

A core team shall be constituted by representatives of this MoU for realization of the objectives of this MoU. This core team will be constituted by 10 June 2019.
The core team shall prepare an action plan with specific goals for achieving the objectives of MoU. They shall take into consideration the academic, commercial and legal aspects of this co-operation.
The proposed action plan shall be reviewed and approved by representatives of both parties.
The core team shall be supported and authorised to take all necessary actions to implement the action plan in an effective, speedy and dynamic manner.
Revenue sharing shall be decided on case to case basis by core team.

Media Coverage

The news of this event was published by major media houses:

Lok Mat (22 May 2019).
Pudhari (22 May 2019).
Sakal (22 May 2019).
Surajya (22 May 2019).

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/mou-between-pah-solapur-university-and-cis

Wikisource Workshop at Vigyan Ashram, Pabal

subodh — 2019-06-23T03:26:53Z

The Centre for Internet & Society's Access to Knowledge team (CIS-A2K) organized a workshop in collaboration with Vigyan Ashram, Pabal on May 25-26, 2019 at Pabal. Total 12 participants attended sessions during this two days workshop. The basic skills in digitisation, uploading on Commons and Wikisource process were imparted in the workshop. Jayanta Nath was the facilitator.

Active members of Wikisource at Vigyan Ashram have expressed their interest in learning advanced skills on VP. Previously, they have scanned & uploaded 50+ books on Commons, OCR'd 10,000+ pages and proofread few pages. This team wants to learn advanced skills in processing scanned books, metadata linking with Wikidata, Wikisource - proofreading & layout skills, tools etc. The institution has also planned to integrate proofreading activity with the Unicode/FOSS training courses, so that the students will be involved in next academic year. The primary objectives of the workshop were:

To impart :

Basic orientation to Wikisource
Understanding of Wikisource work flow
Skills required from scanning to OCR of book
skills for Proof-reading, transclusion methods

Agenda

Introduction to Wikisource - features, scope and future potential
Wikisource work flow - explanation of different stages
Upload tools and Copyrights
OCR4Wikisource and Indic OCR
Proofreading methods and Tools required
Wikisource tools, gadgets
Transclusion methods
Wikidata linkage

Day 1

Day one started with training on Scanning and post processing methods. The expert trainer explained various programmes to clean files & make the pdf of book. He also reviewed the previous work done at Vigyan Ashram and gave important suggestions. All the participants scanned 20 pages and processed them for practise. Then copyright issues and various licenses were discussed with some examples on Commons. The big size books were uploaded by chunkedupload tool. This will be useful in future as it reduces time and space also. After the uploading session, the basics of Wikisource project were explained by Jayanta Nath. He demonstrated proof-reading methods and the related tools, gadgets required. Some scripts for proof-reading are not imported in Marathi Wikisource. The need analysis was done to identify basic minimum templates and gadgets.

The participants learned to make their common.js pages to install the scripts. The hands-on activity was done by distributing the pages of one book for all the members. Day one started with training on Scanning and post processing methods. The expert trainer explained various programmes to clean files & make the pdf of book. He also reviewed the previous work done at Vigyan Ashram and gave important suggestions. All the participants scanned 20 pages and processed them for practise. Then copyright issues and various licenses were discussed with some examples on Commons.

The big size books were uploaded by chunkedupload tool. This will be useful in future as it reduces time and space also.After the uploading session, the basics of Wikisource project were explained by Jayanta Nath. He demonstrated proof-reading methods and the related tools, gadgets required. Some scripts for proof-reading are not imported in Marathi Wikisource. The need analysis was done to identify basic minimum templates and gadgets. The participants learned to make their common.js pages to install the scripts. The hands-on activity was done by distributing the pages of one book for all the members.

Day 2

On the second day, three active Wikimedians and one new member from Pune joined group at Vigyan Ashram. After the recap of first day activity, the review of status of Marathi Wikisource was taken. The practise session for proof-reading & layout of pages continued till lunch break. In the second half, final process of transclusion was explained in detail. The participants also learnt about the various methods for different forms of books. The final layout for reading the books on Wikisource and formats for downloading the books were also discussed.

In the last session, the future plan of Wikisource activity was discussed. The organisation has decided to involve all the trainees in this activity to enhance the skills as well as knowledge. The active community members have planned to spread the awareness about the Wikisource in the society for more content donation and increasing editor base.

Follow-up

Consistent activity for the new trainees is planned with trained team at the institute. Scanning of rare and re-licensed books from libraries is in progress. This activity will be scaled up in near future.

The blog post was originally published on Wikimedia Blog

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-may-26-2019-wikisource-workshop-at-vigyan-ashram

Wikipedia assignments workshop for Post Graduate students in PAH Solapur University

subodh — 2019-06-22T03:21:39Z

On May 3, 2019, Centre for Internet & Society's Access to Knowledge team (CIS-A2K) along with PAH Solapur University conducted a Wikipedia workshop for students from the post-graduate stream in PAH Solapur University. Ten students from Mass Communication department and three faculty members participated in the workshop. Prof. Ravindra Chincholkar and Subodh Kulkarni were the facilitators for the workshop.

CIS-A2K is working in collaboration with PAH Solapur University, Solapur in Maharashtra on Wikimedia projects. The Mass Communication and Journalism departments are involved in content generation on Marathi Wikipedia & Commons for the last two years. In 2019, the department has given assignment in the form of Wikipedia articles for Post graduate course. The primary objectives of the workshop were:

To review the articles by students. The articles are given as assignment by Mass Communication department.
IPWT sessions for potential students for quality improvement and retention

The Mass Communication department has involved students in Marathi Day and Independence Struggle edit-a-thons conducted by Marathi Wiki community. After this experience of Wikimedia projects, the faculty decided to give assignments on the theme - Newspapers & notable editors in pre-independence era. The students explored offline & online references for the content. They first prepared the articles in Word document, which were verified by faculty and A2K representative. The manual of style, using citoid for references and Wikipedia pillars were explained. After the verification of content, the articles were uploaded on Marathi Wikipedia. About 40 articles were created by 10 students and two faculty members. As the stories of editors and journalists in the British period were full of sacrifice & adventure, the students got inspiration also. The faculty reviewed the assignment completion process with the stakeholders in the last session. The department has decided to plan the process more systematically in the next academic year. It has also decided to replicate this methodology for other departments in the university.

This was originally published on Wikimedia Blog

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-may-3-2019-wikipedia-assignments-workshop-for-pg-students-pah-solapur-university

SVG Translation Workshop at KBC North Maharashtra University

subodh — 2019-04-26T06:47:40Z

The Centre for Internet & Access to Knowledge (CIS-A2K) wing organized an SVG translation workshop in collaboration with KBC North Maharashtra University, Jalgaon on 14-15 March 2019. The workshop was a part of India level campaign. Total 58 participants attended the workshop and contributed to Commons till 31 March 2019.

Background

During the edit-a-thons and thematic workshops, the need for images in Marathi was realised. Many articles on health and science have images with labels in English. The issue was discussed with few institutions. KBC University came forward to start the activity under this campaign.

Objectives

Orientation of Wikimedia projects
Localisation of SVG images
Commons upload policies and process

Facilitators

Krishna Chaitanya Velaga -- User: KCVelaga
Subodh Kulkarni, CIS-A2K --Subodh (CIS-A2K)
Prof. Manish Joshi, SOCS KBCNMU, Jalgaon -- Joshmanish
Dr. Snehalata B. Shirude, SOCS KBCNMU, Jalgaon --Snehalata Shirude

Agenda

Introduction to Wikimedia projects, Marathi Wikipedia, Commons
Account creation, basic editing skills
Copyrights, Commons upload process
Graphics images, types of formats, features
Installation of fonts, Inkscape
Resources for translation, verification before uploads
Selection of images, tags, categories for upload
Using translated images in local Wikipedia

Report

As the participants were not aware of Wikimedia projects, the first two sessions dedicated to an introduction to various projects. The participants opened accounts on a smartphone and created user pages after logging in on computers. They were introduced to basic skills in Wikipedia editing, giving references/wiki links and adding images from Commons. The Commons platform was explained in detail. The missing images in Marathi language articles and Commons as well were shown. The discussion on these topics resulted in understanding the need for SVG translation exercise.

The next session was to download and install the necessary software on each computer. The participants installed Google Input Tools for Marathi typing and also Inkscape. Before translating images on Inkscape, the students first practised Marathi typing on their sandboxes. After this, the main graphics sessions were conducted. Krishna explained various types of formats, differences between raster and vector graphics, the importance of SVGs and actual SVG file translation process. He demonstrated the process for images with different difficulty levels. They were introduced to resources available as a part of the campaign for SVG translation and necessary techniques. The usage of various online resources like encyclopedia and thesaurus available was also explained. The images were selected and working tags were applied by the participants. The faculty facilitated the process of work distribution among the students. The participants were able to upload 100+ images on the first day.

Pictured above: Students from Day 1 helping others on Day 2 (Picture by Subodh Kulkarni)

On Day 2, around 20 participants newly joined the workshop. This group comprised of teachers, journalists, doctors, and other enthusiastic citizens. Active students from Day 1 facilitated the training of this new batch. Having conducted a session on the previous day greatly helped to facilitate this session easily. The experienced teachers and citizens helped others to get correct translations and terms. This boosted the speed of the work. The images were also used in the articles on Marathi Wikipedia.

With the help of science teachers, the images were verified before uploading to Commons. Due to active participatory work on the second day, the total images crossed 200 mark. The students continued to contribute till last day of campaign i.e. 31 March. At the end, due to consistent work Marathi category reached the highest number with a total of 357 images among all Indian languages. The workshop and further work was well organized and motivated by Prof. Manish Joshi and Prof. Snehalata Shirude from Computer Science department.

Link to the Wikipedia page report here

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-april-10-2019-svg-translation-workshop-at-kbc-north-maharashtra-university

Content Donation Sessions with Authors

subodh — 2019-04-10T01:28:21Z

CIS-A2K has adopted an integrated approach towards knowledge generation in Marathi language. With the involvement of various stakeholders in different programmes, CIS-A2K facilitated a comprehensive workshop for publishers, printers, designers and writers on 7 September 2018.

The State Govt. Language department, All India Marathi Literary Body & All India Marathi Publishers Consortium took the lead to organize this workshop. In this workshop, noted authors Sunilkumar Lawate and Laxmikant Deshmukh expressed their willingness to donate their books to Wikimedia projects. The awareness about content donation was spread among the writers' community through this workshop.

Objectives

To promote the concept of content donation in Wikimedia projects
To develop repository of reference books on Commons & Wikisource
To facilitate organizations working in developmental sector for developing open knowledge on internet

Report

To promote Marathi language, Marathi language fortnight (1-15 January) and Marathi Day (27 February) was celebrated in Maharashtra. CIS-A2K organized various events on this occasion with state government, publishers, writers and other stakeholders in knowledge business. Some of the authors responded to the appeal to donate their literature in public domain. The following content donations were received in February and March 2019.

Book on Home Composting

Kaustubh Tamhankar, an active citizen from Thane is promoting innovative home composting methods for zero garbage. He has produced some manuals and videos on the process. As the awareness about environment friendly lifestyle is increasing, the author thought of releasing the first manual on Commons. CIS-A2K community advocate (CA) trained him in basics of Wikipedia and Commons. He completed the OTRS process and uploaded the book on zero garbage. He has planned to upload some more manuals and videos in future.

Books by Sunilkumar Lawate

Pictured above: Cover page of the book 'V. S. Khandekar Biography' by Sunilkumar Lawate

Prof. Sunilkumar Lawate is an educationist, social activist and writer in Maharashtra. He participated in the FOSS & Wikimedia workshop conducted in September 2018. He approached CIS-A2K for release of his books in CC-BY-SA on the occasion of Marathi Day on 27 February. CA trained the author in copyrights, Commons upload process and OTRS process in the session held at Kolhapur on 27 February. Prof. Lawate uploaded his 21 books on Commons. These are reference value books on education, child rights, literature, autobiographies, social issues and classic literature. The newspapers covered this event as feature of Marathi day. Because of good media coverage, many responses from other authors in Maharashtra have been received for content donation.

Books by Lek Ladaki Abhiyan

We all know that vast amount of training materials and case studies are produced in development sector. But it is not available to society at large. It is restricted to NGOs, funding agencies, etc. for project period. If it is brought in Wikimedia, it will be searchable for all and will be linked to various articles also as reference resource. CIS-A2K is approaching several such organizations for content donations. CIS-A2K received positive response from Adv. Varsha Deshpande, President of Lek Ladaki Abhiyan, Satara about bridging gender gap activities on Wikimedia projects. Lek Ladaki Abhiyan (LLA) is one of the most active organizations working on Women's issues in Maharashtra. The activities cover wide range of issues viz. stopping child marriages, counselling workshops for adolescents, pre-marriage counselling, child labour issues, legal aid to women facing violence, sting operations for exposing cases of female foeticide, hostel for girls etc.

LLA organization is involved in content generation on women's issues for the last two years with the support of CIS-A2K. The process proved useful for the members and other participants. On the occasion of Women's day on 9th March, LLA re-licensed 8 books and uploaded on Commons. The convener Adv. Varsha Deshpande has authored 6 books. She has taken this noble initiative. The content is spreading across beneficiaries and getting good feedback also. The books cover all the issues mentioned above. The articles created in women's day workshop and books donated by this organization have contributed to reduction in gender gap. LLA would like to lead the movement with other like-minded organizations in urban, rural, tribal areas to facilitate the open knowledge generation on women's issues.

Books by Laxmikant Deshmukh

Laxmikant Deshmukh is former IAS and writer in Maharashtra. He was president of All India Marathi Literary Festival in 2017 at Badoda. He was co-organizer for the FOSS & Wikimedia workshop conducted in September 2018. From that event, he has been promoting open knowledge concept and Wikimedia projects. The training session at Pune was held on 16 March for re-licensing his 4 works. The books are on socio-economic issues of Maharashtra.

Link to the Wikipedia page report here

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/content-donation-sessions-with-authors

Wikimedia projects orientation session at Tata Trust's Vikas Anvesh Foundation

subodh — 2019-04-09T00:56:25Z

Researchers in development sector produce a pool of training material and case studies. However, these do not trickle down to the society and many in the public domain are unaware of the same.

Largely the research is restricted to non-profit organizations or their funding agencies during the project period. If the research carried out in development sector is re-licensed and then linked to Wikipedia articles as references we could see a larger section of the society gaining access to such information. The twin advantages of posting such content is that the information will be searchable online through search engines and the Wikipedia page with numerous hyperlinks leading to different sources will act as a reference resource. Larger sections in the public domain will have access to information which would perhaps be hard to gain access to.

Pictured above: Meeting at Vikas Anvesh Foundation office to discuss the possibility of disseminating the research work done, through Wikipedia. Subodh Kulkarni was the resource person for the meeting. [Picture by Sdeora14 licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license].

Orientation Session

Keeping this in view an orientation session was conducted by Centre for Internet & Society’s Access to Knowledge wing (CIS-A2K) at Tata Trust’s Vikas Anvesh Foundation (VAF) in Pune. CIS-A2K and VAF joined hands to explore possibilities of content enrichment in Wikimedia projects. Dr. Ajit Kanitkar and Subodh Kulkarni were the facilitators for the session attended by eight participants.

Report

The researchers at VAF presented their publications in the form of study reports, papers in journals and conferences and datasets. Advisor Ajit Kanitkar presented story of 'Gems of Purest Ray Serene', a book about the life stories of twenty-two outstanding Indian social workers. The content of the book is uploaded on VAF's website socialworkindia.in which is freely downloadable. The book is published in Marathi and Hindi language also.

After the presentations from VAF, CIS-A2K facilitator presented different Wikimedia projects.In the discussions, it was realised that Wikipedia articles related to social issues and development sector lack reliable references. The research work on VAF website can be linked as references. The publications could be uploaded on Wikisource for wider reach. The images and videos during the work can also be uploaded on Commons.

Follow-up

VAF will discuss the process of content donation with management and decide on the further steps. The training regarding Wikipedia editing and Commons uploads would be planned.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-april-9-2019-wikimedia-projects-session-at-tata-trust-vikas-anvesh-foundation