The Hindu has a nice feature on the Indian open standards policy. The
examples cited in this article are very relevant.
Venky
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A radical shift in e-governance
On November 12, in a very progressive and sound move, the Union Ministry of
Communication and Information Technology notified the National Policy on
Open Standards in e-governance
An Indian case study of how open standards can make an impact on the
domestic technology industry and promote innovation, by offering a
level-playing field for technology companies — both big and small — is the
Smart Card Operating System for Transport Applications (SCOSTA).
SCOSTA was a standard developed for smart card-based driving licences and
transport-related documentation by different State governments. It was
developed by the National Informatics Centre in collaboration with the
Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. Despite attempts by proprietary
lobbies to make the body opt for a proprietary standard, the NIC and
academics went ahead and developed an open standards, one that comprised
technological specifications that were entirely royalty-free, and put up the
specifications on their website. By doing so, they made a huge impact on the
entire market.
http://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/technology/article907442.ece