Dear all,

SFI, one of main students organisation in India passed a resolution to support free software. See below for the details.

regards arun.

Free Software in Education

Free software has proved that it is a means of intellectual self reliance in the field of computing. With the growing pace of usage of computers and internet as a means of encyclopedia of learning resource, the need of softwares has increased at a similar pace. Free software unlike proprietary software allows the users to go through the entire source code and allows us to modify adapt and develop the software for ones requirements. This feature has allowed volunteers across the world to develop the entire operating systems into their own languages. At a time when knowledge is being commodified and concentrated into the hands a few monopolies by patenting and copyrights, free software by virtue of its licensing methods negates the copyrights with copy left licensing. SFI demands that Free Software should be used from School level to the University and research institutions, which not only protects our freedom but allows us to save huge amount of funds being paid for licenses in purchasing proprietary softwares. SFI further demands that the central government should take steps to start research institutions for the development of free software with necessary infrastructure should be started across the country.