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Valedictory
GIS in the Internet Era: Opportunities and Challenges for India
N. Vittal
Central Vigilance Commissioner
Geographic Information System (GIS) is the net result of two key technologies, the technology of satellite imagery and information technology, which is the synthesis of computers and communication. Both of them have certain common features. First is
The pervasive impact of digital technology. Everything is reduced to binary digits zero and one. It is this technology, which has helped the growth of convergence of text, audio and video and a wide range of uses and means of communication. Today we can make computers talk to each other. We can cross the barriers of time and space thanks to the digital technology.
Digital technology is thus at the root of GIS consisting of satellite technology and information technology. There is another dimension again which bring satellite technology and information technology together. They have meant the death of distance. Barriers and national boundaries were common features in the last 300 years especially after the French Revolution where the nation state became the major reference point for organising countries and governance. It is out of national boundaries that the whole set of governance and administration came up. What information technology especially the Internet is doing is to remove this barrier. Thanks to the Internet, today it is possible for the citizen in even centrally controlled or totalitarian regimes to have information about what is happening in the rest of the world. Similarly, satellite imagery has also helped to cross national borders and access information. We in India are aware of the fact that while the Ministry of Defence may be considering a particular map to be a restricted map and make it difficult for the Indians to access it, the same way may be freely available through the United States or other countries, which have their satellite maps.
Apart from the common technology underlying GIS spanning satellite and information technologies, there is also this common feature of looking at the entire world as one unit-Vasudhika kutumbakam in a new sense.
What are the challenges and opportunities in this so far as India is concerned? The entire issue of GIS can perhaps be looked at from three angles. The first is purely the hardware aspect, the second is the content and the third, of course, is the policy framework which includes legal and administrative matters. So far as the hardware part is concerned, if GIS has to become an important feature in the knowledge economy of India then the simplest thing we would require is the capacity for making the GIS accessible to as many people as possible. Forums like the Maps 2000 are occasions where people in this sector come together and exchange ides about how we can increase the reach of the technology. An interesting feature of the modern technology whether it is space technology or information technology, is that the costs are coming down and there is a wide reach across national borders. When it comes to the last mile or making it available to the ultimate user, there are a lot of problems. It is on this last mile problem that attention has to be focussed. For India, the starting point would be the low computer density. However, one positive aspect is that Government seems to have realised the significance of information technology. Three reports of the National Task Force on Information Technology are before the Government. The first report has already been accepted. The recent budget of the Government also showed that the Government has a soft corner for the information technology. It is the responsibility of those who are in this sector to look at what specific measures are needed to see that the physical reach of GIS is enhanced by increasing computer density and also building in national information infrastructure.
The second and perhaps the most important part of the issue is creating content. It is here that many Indian companies are already doing the work for foreign countries in bringing GIS. For example, Intergraph is one company I recall which is specialising in this area. There may be other companies which are specialising in content. There has been a systematic effort made to see how quickly the content for the GIS can be enhanced. Andhra Pradesh has done a wonderful job in bringing GIS for their state and particularly in areas like highways and irrigation, I think contents created are so useful that the quality of governance of the state can easily go up because of clarity of thought and speedy action.
In the context of liberation and economic development, one of the issues that has been widely discussed is the need of upgrading the infrastructure GIS can play a crucial role in upgrading the infrastructure because practically, I think, no infrastructure project, be it a power project or roads or communication or even urban infrastructure like sewage or gas lines can be set up without proper GIS support. The challenge of designing the contents for the GIS to meet the demands of different sectors of the infrastructure projects which will be coming up in this decade has to be met on a priority basis.
We then come to the basic issue of creating this content as quickly as possible. I think the whole GIS movement will get a great boost if the fact that a lot of employment can be generated in creating content and also designing the different contents for specific users is properly projected. Bibliographic database alone according to Dr. Viswanathan, Director, INSDAC who made an assessment sometime back can create 3 lakh to 30 lakh jobs. Think of the jobs that can be created in GIS by different sector specific projects focussed content creation.
We then come to the third aspect of GIS namely the policy dimension. It is here, I think, the final battles have to be fought because when it comes to maps of Survey of India, still there are hitches about the security restricted maps and so on. We must be able to overcome this quickly so that national security is not compromised. The growth of GIS information and making optimum use of the potential of India is not adversely affected because of policy constraints.
The economic dimension of GIS is more than an opportunity than a challenge. The opportunities lies in the use of India's skill in GIS and its infrastructure through way of satellites which can help us to get a share of the global market. I understand that the satellite imagery maps SRO are much better than many of the competitors. We must be able to make use of the infrastructure already developed by us in terms of equipments and satellites on the one hand and more important the technical skills we have created on the other so that the GIS can become in the age of the internet a major source of foreign exchange earning for India.
We have looked the GIS angle but what about the Internet? Internet is only the new medium for commerce. E-commerce is not possible with out Internet. Once we have created the GIS content and the basic backbone in India for overcoming the last mile problem and the reach of the internet is extended widely in the country, then by making optimum use of the Internet is extended widely in the country, then by making optimum use of the internet we ensure that the value of the GIS is enhanced many-fold. Internet can be multiplier to see that the investments made in the India's GIS infrastructure both in terms of hardware, in terms of software and human skills gets the maximum returns.
Einstein supposed to have said that in times of challenge and crises, imagination is more important than knowledge. Perhaps when it comes to use of GIS by India in the age of Internet, we require a lot more imagination. There is no limit to what India can achieve in the age of the Internet using a technology like GIS.
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