UNESCO office in New Delhi, as a clearinghouse for dissemination and sharing of information and knowledge in all fields of UNESCO’s competence, published ebook Open Access to Knowledge and Information: Scholarly Literature and Digital Library Initiatives – the South Asian Scenario. I wrote earlier that some of the major edu. institutions started to practice free flow of information (some didn’t yet) by giving the open access to their repositories of electronic documents, realizing that locked archives are keeping their users, mostly academics, researchers, away from the source of knowledge and information. For global institution for Educational, Scientific and Cultural affairs – UNESCO, open access is “ an innovative mode of scholarly communication within the digital environment, which is gaining momentum in developed countries that already have necessary information infrastructure.” One of the conditions for information structure is developed information society, and the book presents successful open access initiatives in the South Asia sub-region, available in the forms of “open courseware, open access journals, metadata harvesting services, national-level open access repositories and institutional repositories.” It is good to know about South Asian initiatives and efforts in making the knowledge and information open! You can download this book here.
This is what I wrote on free education:
I try to understand the economics of education,
but in it is the politics of my fate.
Alas those who control it are thinking of felicitation
of a lost cause and closed gate.
My education asks me to hold reason
which appeals in favour of so many kinds
it is a fallen season where people have forgotten mankind.
Everyone fights against negativity
hopeless lies my love
you could not give me a smile of positivity
and an education which looked at mankind all above.
You will argue
and with the best of your vile
but what will lie vague
is the reason which could calculate a contented smile.