Reason for FOSS Adoption

This is the seventh post of the series 'FOSS INNOVATION IN INDIAN COURTS: Inspired by the Allahabad High Court'. It talks about why we adopted FOSS.

Statue of Mahatma Gandhi in Johannesburg, South Africa

FOSS INNOVATION IN COURTS: Inspired by the Allahabad High Court

Introduction|| Computerisation of Indian Courts|| FOSS Introduction - Allahabad High Court|| Further Inroads of FOSS in Allahabad High Court|| E-Committee Adopts FOSS|| Problem With Linux Desktop|| Reasons for FOSS Adoption|| 

इस इस चिट्ठी को हिन्दी में यहां  पढ़ा जा सकता है।

Many asked us, why did we adopt FOSS; why we fought with the E-committee and chose to go our own way that ultimately led the E-Committee to adopt FOSS. Was it the cost effectiveness or was it the stability of FOSS or was it the lack of viruses. In fact, it was much more than this. 

The beginning of the last century witnessed the emergence of a semi-clad Indian, referred to as 'half naked Fakir' by Winston Churchill. His philosophy was, 

'Means are more important than the end: it is only with the right means that the desired end will follow.' 

To the charge that 'means are after all means', he would say, 

‘After all, means are everything.’ 

His name was Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi – known to the World as Mahatma Gandhi, father of our nation.

His philosophy is deep rooted in law as well. Lord Denning one of the greatest judges of the 20^th century. In R Vs IRC Exparte Rossminster Ltd 1979 (3) All ELR 385, he observed, 

‘But it is fundamental in our law that the means that are adopted ... should be lawful means. A good end does not justify bad means.'

In today's World, 

• The end is dissemination, communication, and retrieval of information; and 
• The means are, how to achieve it, implement it, the kinds of software to use, the kinds of standards to adopt, the kind of formats to employ. 

Open source and open format are good means, and it is for this reason that we adopted them. 

Let me elaborate our reasons by a story from Panchtrantra. This will be in the next and final post of the series.

#FOSS #FreeOpenSourceSoftware #OpenSourceSoftware #AllahabadHighCourt #IndianCourts #ECommittee #FOSSAdoptionReasons