Why free software is God’s gift to India

There are compelling reasons for the adoption of free software in India. And as IndLinux localises GNU/Linux to Indian languages, a countrywide computing revolution is in the offing. The free software approach is absolutely apt for India in the digital age as it makes possible cultural, political and economic freedom, says VENKATESH HARIHARAN. [Adapted from his address at GNUnify 2003, held recently at Pune]

GNU/Linux represents one of the finest opportunities for taking the benefits of information technology to the masses. From the standpoint of cultural, political and economic freedom, there are enormous reasons why the GNU/Linux operating system is relevant to India’s future in the digital age.

That is the reason why IndLinux.org was started, to localise GNU/Linux to Indian languages. I am happy to announce the launch of the first release of IndLinux Hindi, called Milan. The Milan software represents the culmination of three years of work, and we plan to localise GNU/Linux in Marathi, Gujarati and other Indian languages soon to spark off a revolution in computing in Indian languages.

From a research standpoint, my interest is in the history of technology and in the impact of technology on society. Based on observed trends in the past, I predict that there will be a hundred million computers in India. To work backwards from this number, let me draw an analogy with other technology that is fairly recent.

The TV revolution

The domestic software industry today reminds me of the TV industry around 6-7 years ago. Around six years ago, most of the TV channels were either in English or in Hindi. So how does that compare to the domestic IT scenario in India?

Today, almost all applications and operating systems are in English, a language spoken by a mere 5 percent of India. Even if you run Indian language software, it is usually within an environment that is predominantly in English. Compare this with the situation around six years ago when regional languages were broadcast in two-hour slots on channels that were mostly in English or Hindi.

How things have changed! In the last six years, the explosion of regional channels has been absolutely incredible. Tod-ay, each of India’s regional languages has at least two TV channels. At one point in time one could never have imagined an elitist channel like Star TV broadcasting in Hindi. Now, they are looking beyond Hindi to other Indian languages. Who had heard of channels like Zee or Asianet or Lashkara a decade ago? Who could have visualised 60 million TV sets in India?

This reminds me of an old saying in the technology industry. Old hands in this industry say that in the near-term we always overestimate the impact of technology, and in the long-term, we always underestimate it.

The reason for the explosion in regional-language TV channels is simply because that’s where the markets lie, and a similar thing is going to happen to the computing industry in India.

Many countries do not have populations that add up to the speakers of a single language in India. A few years ago, when I was in Hungary, I saw that most computer operating systems were in the Magyar script. Think about it. A mere 14 million people speak the Magyar language, yet they have an operating system of their own. Yet the third largest spoken language in the world—Hindi—that is spoken by 402 million people, has no operating system! How can we call India an IT superpower when we do not even have an operating system in our largest spoken language?

If you look deep into the computer, the only language it understands is the binary language that consists of zeroes and ones. It is India that developed the concept of the zero and gave it to the world. And we cannot even develop an operating system of our own!

At IndLinux we wanted to create an operating system for India, and when we looked around, there was only one choice—GNU/Linux because we could not modify proprietary operating systems. If I wanted to translate "file" into the Hindi equivalent, I had no freedom to do that. The GNU/Linux operating system was a natural choice because it gave us the freedom to add interfaces in any language we chose. Speaking of any language, as the table shows, the top twelve Indian languages are each spoken by numbers larger than the entire population of Hungary!

Click on image for larger view
Language	Spoken by
Hindi	402
Bengali	83
Telugu	78.7
Marathi	74.5
Tamil	63.2
Urdu	51.8
Gujarati	48.5
Kannada	39
Malayalam	36.2
Oriya	33.5
Punjabi	27.9
Assamese	15.6
Figures in millions Source: Census of India

Cultural freedom

The first freedom I mentioned was cultural freedom. From a cultural standpoint, GNU/Linux was an attractive alternative because when linguistic groups come together to localise GNU/Linux in a transparent manner, localisation can be done in a manner that is far more culturally sensitive than any centrally-controlled process.

For example, should "file" be called a "file" in Hindi because the word is now part of the popular lexicon among Hindi speakers or should it be called something else? Who should decide this? Should a software company decide this or should local linguistic groups decide this?

Apart from this, there are other cultural issues that are so deeply embedded in computers that we are not even aware of them. For example, the whole metaphor of "desktops" and "files and folders" evolved from the work of Ben Schneiderman who argued that the interface of the computer must reflect the real world around us. In rural India, where most people have never owned a desk and are used to squatting on the floor, desktops and files and folders clearly do not reflect their reality. Yet, rural India is where 70 percent of India lives. Therefore, an enormous amount of research needs to be done to invent appropriate user-interface metaphors for India and GNU/Linux is an ideal platform to do this.

Political and economic freedom

The second freedom I mentioned was political freedom. We all know that we are in the digital age and one of the most fundamental platforms of the digital age is the operating system. Therefore, any sovereign nation has to make vigorous efforts to control this platform. From a political standpoint, GNU/Linux is one of the most attractive platforms for a sovereign India, because of its openness.

The third freedom is economic freedom. In developing countries like India, the per capita income is around $410. If the cost of operating systems and application software itself add up to this number, it is impossible for the vast majority of India to afford this technology. In countries like the US, where per capita incomes are around $30,000, it may be affordable, but not in India. What India needs is software that’s priced in rupees and not in dollars and GNU/Linux fits the bill since it is available free.

Therefore, it is clear that there are compelling reasons for the adoption of free software. IndLinux.org is committed to keeping software free—free as in freedom of speech, free as in free beer and free as in free chai! We want to empower every Indian with this technology and believe that this effort is fundamental to India’s future.

Venkatesh Hariharan is a co-founder of IndLinux. He can be contacted at venky@indlinux.org