Cross-posting

07/05/13 Hyderabad

In favour of Publication

Sub :AICTE removes the mandatory clause from the notice on implementing Office-365.

A delegation from the Free Software Movement of India and other groups have submitted a representation demanding the revision of the decision of the AICTE making the usage of Office-365 mandatory on the 30th of April 2013.

A group of young parliamentarians led by P Rajeev also made a representation to the AICTE chairman raising concerns that were similar on 07-05-13. The signatories include Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Sitaram Yechury, KN Balagaopal, PK Biju CP Narayanan, Prashantho Chatterjee, Tapan Sen, Dr T Seema and MP Achutan.

We understand that the AICTE has now agreed and is removing the mandatory clause from the notice. We welcome this decision. However, we demand that AICTE should revise the decision of using Office-365 totally, as it is not in the interest of the students, institutions and colleges. AICTE as a public funded body should not engage in supporting proprietary systems.

We also thank all those in the academia, intellectuals, developer community, policy makers and parliamentarians who have taken it up with AICTE for revising the decision.