India’s Fumbled Chance For Sharing Knowledge

By Subbiah Arunachalam and Muthu Madhan, DST-CPR, Indian Institute of Science and OP Jindal Global University

NEW DELHI, Jan 23 – In terms of open access to knowledge, India could have been the Vishwa Guru — the world’s teacher.

As early as 2000, India was making moves to allow taxpayer-funded research to be freely available for anyone in the world to read, share and distribute. But India has squandered that advantage.

Fast forward to 2022, and much of India’s research is still locked up behind the paywalls of corporate academic publishers, while the global science community increasingly questions why taxpayer-funded research should not be available for everyone to read.