I had a few ideas and wanted to run it through you guys.
I think we should lay greater stress on partnerships. We will be able to make a greater impact and work on our strengths if we do that. When I say our strength what I essentially mean is our community and our analytical skills. While I realise what I am proposing is not really "OpenData" but it will be a very good start.
Some organisations I suggest we reach out to are -
1. Accountability Initiative - (check them out here: http://www.accountabilityindia.org/)
I had reached out to the lady who runs it, Yamini Aiyer, for some other reasons. If you look at their home page they have a lot of mention of opendata. During our conversation she told me that they already have MIS data of 12 government ministries ( I dont ask the exact details) but they have not made them available yet. Maybe we can get our hands on that data and then start discussions on them and make that data available on our site.
2. MKSS and Parivartan - These are Delhi based organisations run by Nikhil Dey, Aruna Roy and Arvid Kejriwal. These guys are pioneers of RTI. They run social audits where they scrutinise all the work done by government agencies in particular wards. These guys in all probability have a lot of data which we can play with.
3. Close to Bangalore we have CIVIC. These guys I know for sure have a lot of data on public distribution system for a few wards in Bangalore. The last time I talked to them, they were beginning to do something on social audits. These guys are very open and will be interested in talking to us.
Since I will be in Delhi from next week, once we agree and have a plan/proposal I can reach out to Accountability Initiative and MKSS/Parivartan. My reading is that folks like Yamini, Nikhil and Arvind are generally very interested in such ideas, just that we need to be clear on what we want and what we have to offer.
What do you guys think?
-Shekhar
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