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<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">With respect to Anivar's below mail :</font></font></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"> </font></p><pre><font face="courier new,monospace">"<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">Free Software movement is a Social Movement.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>If some states realised</i></font></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">the arguments raised by a movement it is the victory of the Movement.</font></i></pre><pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">You and me are part of that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>You can Find various examples of Free</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">Software & Open standards adoption in Central Govt Policies, 11th 5</font></i></pre><pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">year Plan, Knowledge Commission Report etc.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>On non-left ruled states,</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">Tamil Nadu did some positive steps on Free Software adoption due to</font></i></pre><pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">ELCOTs intervention. You can find similar examples from Other states."</font></i></pre>
<pre><font face="courier new,monospace"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"> </i><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"> </i></font></pre><pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">I did a study about Free Software in Public Enterprises of Kerala for</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">SPACE<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>in 2005 October & November (Before Left Govt coming to power) .</font></i></pre><pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">It clearly shows more than 95% of successful e-governance projects are</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">on Free Software Platform . Most of them were not political decision</font></i></pre><pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">and silent adoption by the developers (Report is available at</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><a href="http://space-kerala.org/downloads/foss.pdf"><font face="courier new,monospace">http://space-kerala.org/downloads/foss.pdf</font></a><font face="courier new,monospace"> )</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace"> </font></i></pre><pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">And Left's adoption of Free Software Policy in Kerala is also a</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">logical follow up of various actions & discussions initiated by Free</font></i></pre><pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">Software Activists. Even the decision to adopt Free Software in</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><a href="http://mm.gnu.org.in/mailman/listinfo/fsf-friends"><font face="courier new,monospace">IT at School</font></a><font face="courier new,monospace"> was decided in an SCERT meeting (with the support of 85% of</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">teachers) much before<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>2006 elections. But the govt came after</font></i></pre><pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">election got the political advantage of this decision. and we are very</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">happy about that because they are also helping FS movement by adopting</font></i></pre><pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">new policies .</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace"> </font></i></pre><pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">But when people are pushing Bush's binary logic of "Either you are</font></i></pre>
<pre><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><font face="courier new,monospace">with us or You are against us" (only-cpim positions and branding</font></i></pre><pre><font face="courier new,monospace"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">everything else as Anti-CPIM) we have to remind history</i>."</font></pre>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">Free Software has been mentioned here as a Social Movement citing the instances and its effect from Bottom rather than from Top. I am a newbie and don't know much about the history of Freesoftware Movement in India and so have my own indifferences or doubts regarding the above mentioned point, hence kindly correct my doubts or misunderstandings.</font></font></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">As far as my understanding, Social Movement is taking the ideology to different classes of people and involving them too in the movement. Kerala is in the forefront of the promotion of Free Software from among the different states but still most of the students passing out from the Engineering colleges & Diploma schools are unaware about the so called Social Movement or the ideas they are promoting. Obviously they have vague idea about Free Software which many consider is the same as Open source. My question arises here that why the so called Social Movement was not able to create much awareness among the student community in a State which is in the Forefront of promoting Free Software? Why the huge majority of students still unaware of the existence of such a Social Movement? (May be this understanding could be wrong which I made largely from the angle of the students from South Kerala) </font></font></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">I can infer 2 reasons for this. – Either the so called Free Software Movement has never been a Social Movement OR there are some serious flaws in the Free Software Movement. (There could be many other reasons also.)</font></font></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">As a person new to the movement I can't deal with the second reasoning since that should be dealt by those who were part of the so called Social Movement. </font></font></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">Regarding the first point, I would like to provide some thoughts as an engineering student from Kerala who wasn't aware of the Free Software Movement. There was never a technical session or a presentation or a philosophical talk by any of the people associated with the Free Software – Social Movement in my college. Neither did I hear about similar programs in other colleges. There was never any sort of mass campaigning or mobilization efforts I ever saw in my college or heard about in other colleges where I had friends. As I became associated with Free Software Movement I started to understand that the persons who were previously associated with Free Software Movement were mostly those were technically very interested or ideologically very much in synch with Free Software. Such an approach as far as I am concerned could never be called a Social Movement, it could only be called a Group or Forum of similar minded people. Obviously these groups could influence various govt policies due to their efforts but it definitely has its own limitations too. A Govt could not be pressurized to implement the policy unless there is a strong Movement from the bottom or else the Govt should be embodied with the very ideology what the movement from bottom is trying to campaign. </font></font></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">Though there have been various discussions going on around, one thing is obvious how the Left govt headed by CPI(M) supported its cause in Kerala and has been in the forefront of promoting and spreading the ideas of Free Software in India. Due to this support by the Govt, many of the students atleast have a vague idea about the concept and about some of its advantages. But still unaware of the "Social Movement" which made the Govt to implement it! How the various fragmented free software groups were able to exert pressure or were in the fore front of such an initiative from the Top is still not clear to me. Also the mass movements in Kerala mainly led by CPI(M) were also supportive as Anivar itself mentioned "85% of teachers (mainly from KSTA)". Hence a blind mentioning of "<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">Left's adoption of Free Software Policy as a logical follow up</i>" is but trying to hide the reality. How "Free Software Concept" becomes just one of those in CPI(M)'s policies can be discussed detailed in a separate thread but certainly needs a mentioning here to show how it was not just an automatic adoption by the CPI(M) led govt. It would be better also to think what could have been the success which now the activists are trying to attribute to themselves, had CPI(M) not supported or promoted Free Software (which again is impossible since Free Software is naturally a part of the entire Left politics).</font></font></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">If you take the different Mass Movements in Kerala such as students movement, youth movement, teachers movement, science movement etc were in the forefront of organizing people and to create awareness and to fight for various rights and issues concerning the people. These mass movements had a great role in creating the so called "Culture" which someone mentioned was the reason for the spread of Free Software in Kerala. Through Free Software Movement, our priority is not to create only "Users" of Free Software but "Creators" too. An example I can provide of AC3 (Slum Computing Centre in Bangalore). The people who took initiative could have just installed linux in the systems and taught the children basic computer skills. Would that have created them any awareness? But the members went above that and talked to them about Free Software, by involving them in campaignings like that against Microsoft-VTU (in which very few from FSUG, the sole representative of Free Software group in Bangalore participated). </font></font></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">Even in this campaign there was very less participation from the members of FSUG whether for the ground level working for the campaigning or atleast their participation for the program. I have seldom seen anyone proposing to conduct classes atleast for those in IT industry and supporting Free Software Movement to make them more capable in the technical part. I have never heard about any such initiatives by anyone even for the employees in Technopark or Info park. Hence both IT employees and Engg/Diploma students are till now not mobilized or atleast reached to create awareness about Free Software. Then how can this be called a Social Movement? </font></font></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">For mentioning it as a Social Movement we have to follow the approach of the other Mass Movements and going to as much as communities and sections of people as possible which is certainly lacking in the existing movement according to me.</font></font></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">I have heard about the various projects undertaken by the Free Software groups but what I understood was that these projects are focusing more on certain specific areas and might make that particular project very successful or highly qualitative. But what about the quantity? How can we call the movement a Social Movement unless many other sections are still not included in the movement? </font></font></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">Coming back to Karnataka, I find the society itself very different from that of Kerala especially on basis of the Social indices. AC3 was just one centre which we were able to know because some of the Free Software activists were also involved. What about numerous other such centres or slum areas? If some NGO is teaching them basic computer skills, those children are growing under restricted freedom in technology. How to reach them without a Social Movement and just through the existing Mail groups? What about the awareness FSUG is able to create among the Engineering/Diploma students & IT workers in Bangalore? </font></font></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font size="3"><font face="Times New Roman">Please correct whether my understanding was wrong or whatever I mentioned were not correct, if so kindly correct me.</font></font></span></p>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3">Thanks & Regards</font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="COLOR: blue"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3">Nidhin</font></span></div>
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