Will a new Bill handicap budding IT entrepreneurs and basement tinkerers from developing the next big app in India? Will it prove to be a hurdle in the democratic space?
These are the questions being debated as the Ministry of Home Affairs released the draft notification of Geospatial Information Regulation Bill a few days back. The draft bill encompasses the whole gamut of regulation, acquisition, dissemination, publication and distribution of maps and mapping services in the country.
“Yes, we do need a regulation of geospatial information. The laws that we have are from 19th century. The draft is a good place to begin with but it will have to incorporate concerns and issues. As the draft stands it is going to put in place a lot of bureaucracy about rules, content and licences,” says Anant Maringanti of Hyderabad Urban Labs. Incidentally, HUL has mapped a host of issues plaguing Hyderabad ranging from location of toilets to transit points.
“There is concern from activists and civic society since everything has to do with spatial relationships. There is a protest about cutting trees in KBR Park. But nobody knows where the flyovers will come up. But if someone from civil society produces a map they have to get a licence. So, the licensing move can become a tool to stifle democratic protest. That’s the larger issue,” says Mr. Maringanti.
Even tinkerers who may be on the cusp of creating the next big shopping or dating app will be handicapped as people outside the country will have no such limitation.
“It is important that people know the consequences of this draft and participate to give their views and ensure amendments that are fair and forward looking. The draft seems deliberately written to be stifling access to actionable data in the public domain that should be every citizen’s fundamental right to have,” says Venkatesh Goteti of Azri Solutions.
‘Small businesses suffer’
“Beyond the financial impact, small businesses will find it really difficult to cope with the scope of the bill. It covers anyone from a satellite image company to a delivery startup. The bill talks about requisite fees, but its unclear how much this will be. Moreover, the resources required for a vetting process will be an overhead,” ‘said Sajjad Anwar, a Bangalore-based cartographer and programmer. To understand the implications for startups and innovators, one just has to think of location-based food delivery apps, ride-hailing apps and even dating apps. These startups don’t have to worry about costs of the mapping service until they become big. “Now, they may have to do so adding to the overheads. The current scope demands everyone who collects or publishes geospatial information to get a licence. This will affect individual developers the most,” fears Mr. Anwar.
Beyond the worries of hobbling startups with add on costs and limiting democratic space, is the story of missteps with maps. Maps have always been politically loaded statements. But with the proliferation of online images some of them with wrong borders might have been the trigger for the draft bill. Now, it remains to be seen how civic society protests affects its final form.
