Over ₹134 crore spent on proprietary software at premier institutes, says open source collective
An open source advocacy group, FOSS United, reports that Indian higher education institutes have spent over ₹134 crore on proprietary software licenses in five years. The group argues that this reliance on proprietary tools undermines India's technological sovereignty and creates long-term vendor lock-in.
Why it matters
The report highlights a significant financial and strategic tension between India's push for digital independence and the practical reliance of its academic institutions on foreign proprietary software.
Indian universities and eminent technical institutes have spent at least ₹134 crore over the last five years on licences for proprietary software, the open source advocacy FOSS United said, citing responses to queries sent by the collective under the Right to Information Act, 2005.
“Institutions spend crores every year, teaching students software they will never own,” FOSS United said on a portal dedicated to mapping different higher education and research institutes’ software spending. FOSS stands for free open source software.
The spending likely represents only a portion of the overall money spent by institutes for software, used for everything from email, engineering design, assignment submission tools, electronic design automation (EDA) tools for chip design, and so on.
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