The Hindu has a nice feature on the Indian open standards policy. The examples cited in this article are very relevant.

Venky =====

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