Daily Important Day

 National Unity Day

This is Sardar Ballabh Bhai Patel's 150th Birth Anniversary. its also called Ekta Diwas celebrated at Namrada District of  Gujrat.

 Programmes.

Run for Unity

Ekta Pledge

Statue of Unity (Kewadia, Gujrat) 

Daily Inspiration

 Become a person of action, one of those indomitable souls who goes our and hunts down his greatest life. Do the best that you know how to do. and the let go and accept whatever comes to you with a happy heart and perfect certainty that this is what nature intended for you.

Daily Inspiration

 Having clearly defined goals offers so many benefits. First, setting goals restores a sense of focus in our lives, lives that have become complicated by too many options. in this age we live in there are simply far too many things to do at any given time. there are many distractions competing for our attention. goals clarify our desired and help us to focus on only those activities that will lead us to where we want to go.

Daily Reading

 In a recent Elsevier piece titled Librarians as Guides in the Age of AI (October 2025), the narrative takes a reflective turn—acknowledging that librarians today stand at a fascinating crossroads. For decades, we have helped scholars navigate databases, catalogues, and journals. But now, with artificial intelligence entering every corner of research and learning, the librarian’s compass needs to point toward a new North: guiding users through an AI-driven information world.

The article draws from the discussions at the Library Futures Forum, held during the ACRL Conference earlier this year, where librarians openly examined what it means to remain relevant in the age of generative AI. What emerged was a shared understanding that AI is no longer a distant trend; it is an everyday reality in classrooms and research labs. About 28% of students, it notes, use AI daily or every couple of days—another 28% at least weekly. No wonder libraries now feel the pressure to redefine their purpose.

A new kind of literacy is becoming essential. The familiar skills of evaluating journal quality and reference authenticity must now expand to include evaluating AI outputs. Librarians are being called to teach students how to question machine-generated summaries, how to test for bias, and how to craft prompts that yield reliable information. The Elsevier report also points out an unsettling gap: nearly 70% of librarians admit they do not yet feel ready to adopt generative AI tools within the next year. It’s a sobering reminder that the profession must invest heavily in its own AI education.

By the way, the article makes a compelling argument that assessment in education will also need rethinking. If AI can write essays, generate summaries, and even solve problems, then universities might have to lean more on creativity, oral communication, and collaborative projects—forms of assessment that reveal human judgment beyond the reach of machines. And this is where the librarian’s role, as a facilitator of learning, becomes crucial again.

The conversation about tools is equally important. Librarians are asking for AI systems that are transparent, trustworthy, and built upon credible content sources. They want to ensure that the technology integrates smoothly with existing systems and still keeps the human in the loop. The underlying message is clear: libraries must not surrender their ethical and educational mission to black-box systems.

In the larger context, this Elsevier article captures the transformation of librarianship from custodianship to guidance. It calls for professional development, AI literacy, and proactive participation in shaping institutional AI policies. Rather than reacting to AI’s impact, librarians are encouraged to anticipate it—understand how these systems work, where they falter, and how they can be aligned with the core values of openness and equity that libraries have always stood for.

For those of us in India, the message feels timely. Our academic libraries, too, must start mapping how AI could enhance their operations—be it in discovery systems, metadata processing, or research support. Librarians here need structured programmes in AI literacy to evaluate new tools and train students effectively. And above all, institutions should begin drafting clear policies for responsible AI use within academic environments. The journey will not be easy, but it is inevitable—and deeply meaningful.

Because at its heart, this transition is not about technology; it’s about trust. In a world where machines can mimic intelligence, librarians are needed more than ever to guide inquiry, question sources, and keep the human touch alive in knowledge discovery.

https://chat.whatsapp.com/Izaq4qfuRLxJeGCPS5pte4?mode=ems_copy_t

References:
[1] https://www.elsevier.com/connect/librarians-as-guides-in-the-age-of-ai 

Daily Reading

 

Artificial intelligence (AI) tools have become essential in supporting cataloging and metadata enrichment in libraries, helping to streamline workflows and improve metadata quality. Among the leading tools, Alma by Ex Libris stands out with its AI Metadata Assistant, which leverages generative AI to suggest relevant metadata for cataloging. This includes creating and enriching MARC 21 bibliographic records, processing both physical and digital content types, and validating subject headings against standardized vocabularies such as the Library of Congress. Library professionals can review and adjust AI-generated suggestions to ensure accuracy and enhance metadata completeness [1], [2].

 Another noteworthy tool is Annif, widely used for automated subject indexing and classification, notably by the National Library of Finland. Although subject heading prediction accuracy remains an area for improvement, Annif demonstrates considerable potential for tasks like retro-cataloging and identifying bibliographic records with enhanced efficiency [3], [4].

 Large Language Models (LLMs) have also been applied experimentally to automate metadata generation tasks such as titles, authors, subjects, and descriptions. While these models show promise in token classification, they still require significant refinement, especially for precise subject heading assignments [4].

 

AI-powered metadata enrichment systems utilize natural language processing and semantic analysis techniques to generate detailed metadata, including keywords and entities, linked to standardized taxonomies. These enriched metadata sets enhance discoverability within academic and research contexts by connecting works with related datasets and citations [5].

 

Data catalog tools such as Collibra, Amundsen, Marquez, and DataHub incorporate AI and machine learning to automate metadata harvesting, classification, and data lineage tracking. Though primarily designed for data repositories, these platforms' automation and governance capabilities are increasingly relevant to library metadata management [6], [7], [8].

 

Recent advances in AI research focus on federated intelligence of LLMs to automate archival description and improve metadata catalog searches, representing a front line of innovation in library cataloging [9], [10].

 

In conclusion, libraries are leveraging hybrid approaches that combine domain expert oversight with sophisticated AI-driven metadata generation and enrichment tools to handle expanding collections efficiently and enhance user discovery experiences. Alma’s AI assistant currently leads in practical application, supplemented by tools like Annif and ongoing research into LLMs that promise further advancements in cataloging accuracy and efficiency.

 

https://chat.whatsapp.com/Izaq4qfuRLxJeGCPS5pte4?mode=wwt

 

References:

 

[1] "6 best AI tools for librarians in 2025," Jotform, 2025. [Online]. Available: https://www.jotform.com/ai/agents/ai-tools-for-librarians/

 

[2] "The AI Metadata Assistant in the Metadata Editor," Ex Libris, 2025. [Online]. Available: https://knowledge.exlibrisgroup.com/Alma/Product_Documentation/010Alma_Online_Help_(English)/Metadata_Management/005Introduction_to_Metadata_Management/The_AI_Metadata_Assistant_in_the_Metadata_Editor

 

[3] "AI-supported cataloger: a deep dive into intelligent document classification," Emerald, 2025. [Online]. Available: https://www.emerald.com/lhtn/article/42/7/15/1270204/AI-supported-cataloger-a-deep-dive-into

 

[4] "How AI Will Transform Library Cataloging," Liblime, 2025. [Online]. Available: https://liblime.com/2025/10/11/how-ai-will-transform-library-cataloging/

 

[5] "AI Metadata Enrichment: Publishing Discoverability 2025," Luminadatamatics, 2025. [Online]. Available: https://www.luminadatamatics.com/resources/blog/why-ai-metadata-will-define-publishing-discoverability-in-2025/

 

[6] "Top 9 Data Catalog Tools in 2025," Integrate.io, 2025. [Online]. Available: https://www.integrate.io/blog/data-catalog-tools/

 

[7] "Top 26 Data Catalog Tools to Consider in 2025," LakeFS, 2025. [Online]. Available: https://lakefs.io/blog/top-data-catalog-tools/

 

[8] "18 Top Data Catalog Software Tools to Consider Using in 2025," TechTarget, 2025. [Online]. Available: https://www.techtarget.com/searchdatamanagement/feature/16-top-data-catalog-software-tools-to-consider-using

 

[9] "Automated Archival Descriptions with Federated Intelligence of LLMs," ArXiv, 2025. [Online]. Available: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2504.05711.pdf

 

[10] "Leveraging Retrieval Augmented Generative LLMs For Automated Metadata Description Generation to Enhance Data Catalogs," ArXiv, 2025. [Online]. Available: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2503.09003.pdf

 

 

Daily Inspiration

 October 17

Staying in your room and meditating or praying all day fir the life of your dreams is not going to give you the life of your dreams, and believing differently is nothing more then engaging in magical thinking. the best among us are people of action. personal leadership is all about getting important things done. results matter.

Daily Reading

 

PLANNER: A National Convention for North Eastern Region

A series of regional conventions called Promotion of Library Automation and Networking in North Eastern Region (PLANNER) was launched in 2003 to address the problems and issues in North-Eastern Region. This Convention helps the library professionals, as well as IT professionals in North-Eastern region to interact with each other and with professionals from rest of the country to discuss the current issues for mutual benefit. Seven conventions have since been organized on various topics of interest at different locations in North-East including NEHU, Shilong (2003), Manipur University, Manipur (2004), Assam University, Silchar (2005), Mizoram University, Aizawal (2006), Gauhati University, Gauwahati (2007), Nagaland University, Dimapur (2008), Tezpur University, Tezpur, (2009), Sikkim University, Sikkim (2012), Dibrugarh University, Assam (2014), NEHU, Shillong (2016), Tripura University, Agartala (2018) and in series of 12^th Convention PLANNER 2024 is being organized by INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar at Rajiv Gandhi University, Itanagar, Arunachal Pradesh.  

Daily Reading

 

International CALIBER

Convention on Automation of Libraries in Education and Research Institutions (CALIBER), a biennial convention, organized by the INFLIBNET Centre in different parts of the country in collaboration with universities, was initiated in 1994. The convention invites high quality papers on research and technical works, case studies, technology updates, etc. related to the themes and sub-themes of the convention for a given year. The convention provides a unique forum to the library and information professionals, teachers, IT professionals, consultants and users involved in automation and networking of libraries as well as information providers to come together and interact on the subjects of mutual interest. So far, 22 conventions have been organized in collaboration with different universities. The CALIBER 2025, 22^nd in the series and 14^th International CALIBER is being organised in collaboration with Sri Venkateswara University (SVU), Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh,India during November 17-19, 2025.

Daily Reading

 

About OCS

OCS is very useful application for all university libraries who wants to contribute their bibliographic data for INFLIBNET`s Online Union Catalogue of Indian Universities (IndCat). OCS provides "IndCat Book Data" with simple and advanced search options. It gives 'copy', 'edit' and 'create new' options for creating online bibliographic records of book data and then share with INFLIBNET`s IndCat, which benefits academic communities around the world.

OCS 2.0 Portal Launched by Prof. Yogesh Singh, Hon’ble Chairman, Governing Board, INFLIBNET Centre and Vice-Chancellor, DTU, New Delhi on 18^th August 2021.

Daily Reading

 

Software for University Libraries (SOUL) is an state-of-the-art integrated library management software designed and developed by the INFLIBNET Centre based on requirements of college and university libraries. It is a user-friendly software developed to work under client-server environment. The software is compliant to international standards for bibliographic formats, networking and circulation protocols. After a comprehensive study, discussions and deliberations with the senior professionals of the country, the software was designed to automate all house keeping operations in library. The software is suitable not only for the academic libraries, but also for all types and sizes of libraries, even school libraries. The first version of software i.e. SOUL 1.0 was released during CALIBER 2000.

The SOUL 2.0 software was released in January 2009 and the latest version of the software i.e. SOUL 3.0 released in February 2021. The database for new version of SOUL is designed for latest versions of MS-SQL and MySQL (or any other popular RDBMS). SOUL 2.0 is compliant to international standards such as MARC 21 bibliographic format, Unicode based Universal Character Sets for multilingual bibliographic records and NCIP 2.0 and SIP 2 based protocols for electronic surveillance and control.

Daily Reading

 

 IndCat

The development of Union Databases of various library resources i.e. Books, Theses and Serials have been one of the most important activities of the Centre since its inception. In the beginning, the Centre has funded potential universities of the country for creating bibliographic records of their library collections.

The Centre has developed "IndCat: Online Union Catalogue of Indian Universities" that contains bibliographic records of Books, Theses and Serials contributed by participating universities in all disciplines, i.e. Computer Science, Philosophy, Religion, Social Sciences, Technology, Arts, Literature, History and Science.

Currently IndCat Book Database has 1,64,75,356 Unique Records with 2,63,07,842 holding details of 403 Indian Universities, Theses Database has 4,57,064 Unique Ph.D Records of 467 Universities, Serial Database has 37,136 Records of 239 Institutions.

Daily Reading

 

e-Governance and Technical Service

The Centre is awarded ISBN project by the Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Education for the development of a dedicated portal of ISBN and its day-to-day operational work including ISBN allotment, help-desk, etc. The Centre has developed a dedicated portal https://isbn.gov.in/. 

 e-Governance@UGC

The University Grants Commission assigned the responsibility for setting up IT Cell at UGC and development and maintenance of the website of the UGC as well as for automation of its various schemes, Grant Management System and e-Scholarship-Fellowship Award Registration Tracking System (e-SARTS).  

MMTT Programme 

Malaviya Mission is proposed by restructuring/reframing of the existing Scheme/Mechanism of the Capacity Building/Training of Teacher/Faculty in D/o Higher Education. The Mission envisages capacity-building training for the faculty and staff across higher educational institutions, in the light of NEP 2020 within two years through multiple training centers. The Centre is providing designing, development and hosting support for the dedicated portal of Malaviya Mission Teacher Training Programme. 

 

Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat

 Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat programme aims to enhance interaction & promote mutual understanding between people of different states/UTs through the concept of state/UT pairing. The states carry out activities to promote a sustained and structured cultural connect in the areas of language learning, culture, traditions & music, tourism & cuisine, sports and sharing of best practices, etc. 

 

 

Daily Reading

 

e-NBA 

The project, called “Accreditation Workflow Management System (AWMS)” is related to accreditation of technical institution’s programme. The Centre is involved to develop full-fledge online platform of accreditation workflow management system for technical institutes based on requirements provided by National Board of Accreditation. 

NAAC 

The INFLIBNET Centre is awarded a project of validation and verification of bibliometric data for the HEIs undergoing the NAAC Accreditation. Under the project, the Centre is responsible to provide data for bibliometrics related elements for all applicants and also provides support and consultancy services for validation of bibliometrics data. 

Data Services 

The ICSSR has sanctioned a project entitled "Setting-up of Indian Social Science Data Repository for the ICSSR's Data Service" to the Centre. The ICSSR has signed an MoU with Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, New Delhi for providing NSS and ASI datasets which, in turn, are being handed over to INFLIBNET Centre for hosting onto the repository.  

 

DataCite - Global Access Fund

DataCite Global Access Funds is an initiative aimed at promoting and supporting global access to research data. As a nonprofit organization, DataCite seeks to enable researchers, institutions, and organizations around the world to openly share their valuable data resources. The Global Access Funds program provides financial support to cover the costs under the three categories that include Outreach and engagement activities, Open Infrastructure development and integration and Demonstrators. "The GAF is part of the DataCite Global Access Program (GAP) made possible by grant Grant 2022-316573 from the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative" DataCite. The INFLIBNET Centre had applied for the Funds under Outreach category which has been approved by the DataCite for Funding.

Daily Reading

NIRF

The ranking framework outlines a methodology to rank institutions across the country. The INFLIBNET Centre is responsible for the development of NIRF Web Portal including data capturing system, perception capturing system, the feedback mechanism and the ranking platform. The Centre is also involved to provide and verify data on publications, citations, patents and highly cited papers within India.

Daily Reading

 

Swayam Prabha 

The SWAYAM-PRABHA, an MoE project under NME-ICT, is conceived as a group of 40 DTH channels devoted to telecasting of high-quality educational programmes on 24X7 basis using the GSAT-15 transponders. New content for at least four hours is being telecasted that would be repeated 5 more times in a day, allowing the student to choose the time slot as per their convenience. The INFLIBNET Centre is continuing the task of developing portal of SWAYAM PRABHA and its hosting including archiving of videos for all the channel. 

Daily Reading

 

ORCID - GPP 

The Global Participation Fund is a testament to ORCID's commitment to fostering collaboration and engagement within the research community. In this regard, the Centre will conduct 20 ORCID Outreach Programmes in HEIs across the country to promote ORCID ID adoption and implementation across scholarly communication fields & platforms, thereby enhancing the quality and integrity of research and scholarship. As part of the award proposal, the INFLIBNET Centre is conducting an outreach programme titled “One-day User Awareness Program on ORCID and INFLIBNET Services for Scholarly Communities” in selected HEIs region-wise across the country. The main objective of the programme is to create awareness of the use of academic identities, i.e., ORCID, among Indian researchers and academicians.  

Daily Reading

 

 She Research Network in India (SheRNI)

She Research Network in India (SheRNI) is the expert profile network system that connects and leverages the knowledge, skills, and expertise of women across various fields in India. This system aims to empower women by providing opportunities for collaboration, mentorship, and knowledge-sharing. The objectives of this project are to create a national-level expert profile system for women faculty members and facilitate the exchange of expertise, insights, and experiences among women experts in diverse fields.

The system supports the women scientists/faculty members to build a strong professional network that fosters collaboration, mentorship, and career advancement opportunities. The SheRNI expert network system serves as a dynamic platform for women professionals to connect, collaborate, and empower each other, ultimately contributing to the advancement of women in various fields.

 

Sofia Qureshi:Colonel

Terror targets were chosen based on credible intelligence and their involvement in cross-border terrorism. No military installation was targeted in Pakistan during 'Operation Sindoor'. 

 Vyomika Singh: Wing Commander

India has demonstrated considerable restraint in its response. However, the India Armed Forces are fully prepared to respond to a Pakistani misadventure, if any, to escalate the situation. 

 

Daily Reading

 

About IRINS

IRINS is a web-based Research Information Management (RIM) service developed by INFLIBNET Centre. The portal facilitates the academic, R&D organisations and faculty members, scientists to collect, curate and showcase the scholarly communication activities and provide an opportunity to create the scholarly network. The IRINS is available as free software-as-service to the academic and R&D organisations in India.

The IRINS would support to integrate the existing research management system such as HR system, course management, grant management system, institutional repository, open and commercial citation databases, scholarly publishers, etc. It has integrated with academic identity such as ORCID ID, ScopusID, Research ID, Microsoft Academic ID, Google Scholar ID for ingesting the scholarly publication from various sources.

Daily Reading

 

About Vidya-mitra

Vidya-mitra is an online learning portal for all the e-content projects developed under the NME-ICT (National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology), MHRD. The portal provides facility to search and browse all hosted content wherein a learner can easily access the desired material including audio/video learning material, textual material, multimedia-enriched materials etc. through a single interface. Moreover, features of faceted search, usage statistics, project-wise access, My-Space are incorporated in this portal.

About NME-ICT

National Mission on Education through Information and Communication and Technology (NMEICT) is an ambitious project undertaken by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD), Government of India with a view to seamlessly providing quality educational content to all the eligible and willing learners in India. It has envisaged content and connectivity as the twin pedals for initiating and accelerating ICT-enabled Higher Education.

 

Daily Reading

 

About Vidwan

Expert Database and National Researcher Network

VIDWAN is the premier database of profiles of scientists / researchers and other faculty members working at leading academic institutions and other R & D organisation involved in teaching and research in India. It provides important information about expert's background, contact address, experience, scholarly publications, skills and accomplishments, researcher identity, etc. The database developed and maintained by Information and Library Network Centre (INFLIBNET) with financial support from the National Mission on Education through ICT (NME-ICT). The database would be instrumental in selection of panels of experts for various committees, taskforce, established by the Ministries / Govt. establishments for monitoring and evaluation purposes.

Daily Reading

 

About e-PG Pathshala

e-PG Pathshala is an initiative of the MHRD under its National Mission on Education through ICT (NME-ICT) being executed by the UGC.

 

 e-Adhyayan

e-Adhyayan is a repository of e-Books for the Under-Graduate & Post-Graduate Courses. The e-Books are being derived from the e-text of e-PG Pathshala and SWAYAM(UGCMoocs). e-PG Pathshala is OER which is being developed and maintain by INFLIBNET Centre. 

 UGC MOOCs (Online Courses)

UGC-MOOCs is one of vertical to produce course on Post Graduate subjects in SWAYAM (Online Courses, An MHRD initiatives). UGC is one of the national coordinator of SWAYAM & INFLIBNET is technical partner for UGC-MOOCs.

 ILMS (Offline Access)

ILMS i.e. INFLIBNET Learning Management Service offered by the Information and Library Network Centre (An IUC of UGC) to the institutions of higher education across the country. This service is being offered to all the Central, State and Deemed universities on request basis. It provides pre-populated learning content, derived from e-PG Pathshala: A Gateway to PG Courses, as per the prevailing guidelines of UGC.

 

Daily New Word in news

 Habeas corpus......

Daily Reading

 

About INFOPORT: INFLIBNET Subject Gateway for Indian Electronic-Resources

The INFLIBNET Centre promotes open access to Indian scholarly content through the InfoPort: A Subject Gateway for Indian Electronic-Resources. While Centre uses and promotes Intute, a well-known subject gateway developed by MIMAS, UK, the InfoPort is designed and developed to serve as a comprehensive gateway to all Indian scholarly content. The gateway open-ups the Indian scholarly content scattered over the Internet through an integrated interface that support search, browse and multiple listing. The InfoPort selectively catalogues online resources of Indian origin on diversified subjects available in open access through an elaborate process of testing and evaluation. The Centre proposes to collaborate with librarians and scholars in college and universities in the process of identification and selection of resources. The universe of knowledge is divided into different subject groups. According to the Dewey Decimal Classification, the universe of knowledge is scattered from 000 to 999. InfoPort is classified according to DDC, indexed subjectwise and arranged alphabetically subjects. The InfoPort covers Internet resources of Indian origin in the following categories: Electronic books, electronic journals and reference sources including dictionaries, directories, maps etc.; Institutional repositories, resource gateway, etc. Wikis, blogs, etc.; Teaching and learning website; Lecture Notes, Magazines,: Portals; Audio, video and other multimedia learning resources; Libraries, archives and museums; News and media services including newspapers, online news services,; Websites listing current events and activities; Websites of Major Research projects, especially those supported by national funding bodies such as UGC, DST, DBT, AICTE, MHRD, DOT, etc.; Teaching and learning projects website, especially those receiving Government funding; Universities, colleges, Research and Development Labs, institutions and e-learning websites. Indian publishers and subscription agents; and Listservs and discussion groups, especially those having online archives. InfoPort does not cover resources other than those originated in India. More specifically, it does not include Internet resources of the following kinds: Website containing information with potentials of promoting illegal activities; Resources which contravene laws relating to defamation or obscenity; Resources that do not meet our selection and evaluation criteria; Resources designed solely for marketing, advertising and for sale of commercial products; Sites that do not contain significant online resources beyond simple course descriptions, staff directories, etc.; Personal web pages created by and about that individuals; and Audio, video and multimedia website related to Bollywood, etc.

Daily Reading

 

INFLIBNET's Institutional Repository

Welcome to the Institutional Repository of INFLIBNET Centre! Here, you can access articles published in all conventional proceedings of INFLIBNET Centre. Additionally, you will find various training materials, press clippings, newsletters, and more.

For any feedback, please reach out to us at irsupport@inflibnet.ac.in

Daily Reading

 

 About Shodh-Chakra

Shodh-Chakra is an initiative of Information and Library Network (INFLIBNET) Centre under the guidance of University Grants Commission (UGC) to help the academic community during their research life cycle. Shodh-Chakra provides a unique space to the researcher, guide/supervisor and university to manage the research lifecycle of a research scholar. This will work as a digital workspace wherein researchers can collect, store, organize and cite their research work. The Shodh-Chakra would help researchers to create their profile and manage their preferences. The process of using the portal starts with signing an MoU between University and INFLIBNET Centre. The university/institute has to provide valid information of the researcher and supervisor. Further, researcher can login into system and avail the features of Shodh-Chakra. The system will generate login credentials to researchers, supervisors and universities.

Daily Reading

 

About Shodhgangotri

Repository of Research in Progress/Synopses MRPs/PDFs/Emeritus Fellowship

The word “Shodh” originates from Sanskrit and stands for “research and discovery”. “Gangotri” is one of the largest glaciers in the Himalayas and the source of origination of the Ganges, the holiest, longest, and largest of rivers in India. The Ganges is the symbol of age-long culture, civilization, ever-aging, ever-flowing, ever-loving, and loved by its people.

Under the initiative called “ShodhGangotri”, research scholars/research supervisors in universities are requested to deposit an electronic version of the approved synopsis submitted by research scholars to the universities for registering themselves for the Ph.D. programme now it is expanded to MRPs/PDFs/Emeritus Fellowship, etc. The repository on one hand would reveal the trends and directions of research being conducted in Indian universities, on the other hand, it would avoid duplication of research. Synopsis in “ShodhGangotri” would later be mapped to full-text theses in "ShodhGanga". As such, once the full-text thesis is submitted for a synopsis, a link to the full-text theses would be provided from ShodhGangotri to "ShodhGanga".

Daily Reading

 

OPEN ACCESS INITIATIVES

Shodhganga: a reservoir of Indian Theses

Theses and dissertations are known to be the rich and unique source of information, often the only source of research work that does not find its way into various publication channels. Theses and dissertations remain an un-tapped and under-utilized asset, leading to unnecessary duplication and repetition that, in effect, is the anti-theses of research and wastage of huge resources, both human and financial.

The UGC Notification (Minimum Standards & Procedure for Award of M.Phil. / Ph.D Degree, Regulation, 2009 Amendment made on 2016) dated 5th May 2016 mandates submission of electronic version of theses and dissertations by the researchers in universities with an aim to facilitate open access to Indian theses and dissertations to the academic community world-wide. Online availability of electronic theses through centrally-maintained digital repositories, not only ensure easy access and archiving of Indian doctoral theses but will also help in raising the standard and quality of research. This would overcome serious problem of duplication of research and poor quality resulting from the "poor visibility" and the "unseen" factor in research output. As per the Regulation, the responsibility of hosting, maintaining and making the digital repository of Indian Electronic Theses and Dissertation (called "Shodhganga"), accessible to all institutions and universities, is assigned to the INFLIBNET Centre.

"Shodhganga" is the name coined to denote digital repository of Indian Electronic Theses and Dissertations set-up by the INFLIBNET Centre. The word "Shodh" originates from Sanskrit and stands for research and discovery. The "Ganga" is the holiest, largest and longest of all rivers in Indian subcontinent. The Ganga is the symbol of India's age-long culture and civilisation, everchanging, ever-flowing, ever-loved and revered by its people, and has held India's heart captive and drawn uncounted millions to her banks since the dawn of history. Shodhganga stands for the reservoir of Indian intellectual output stored in a repository hosted and maintained by the INFLIBNET Centre.

The Shodhganga@INFLIBNET is set-up using an open source digital repository software called DSpace developed by MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) in partnership between Hewlett- Packard (HP). The DSpace uses internationally recognized protocols and interoperability standards. Shodhganga provides a platform for research scholars to deposit their Ph.D. theses and make it available to the entire scholarly community in open access. The repository has the ability to capture, index, store, disseminate and preserve ETDs (Electronic Theses and Dissertations) submitted by the researchers.

DSpace supports "Open Archives Initiative's Protocol for Metadata Harvesting" (OAI-PMH) and uses a qualified version of the Dublin Core schema for its metadata. The INFLIBNET Centre, promotes setting-up of institutional and ETD repositories in member universities using OAI-PMH complaint software. A number of member universities have already set-up their institutional and ETD repositories using either DSpace or other OAI-PMH compliant Institutional Repository software. It would be possible for universities having sufficient network and computing infrastructure to maintain their own ETD repositories wherein their research scholars could deposit e-versions of their theses and dissertations. Moreover, they can use Shodhganga to host their theses as backup archives. INFLIBNET Centre, besides maintaining the Central ETD Repository (Shodhganga) would also deploy a central server to harvest the metadata from all such ETD repositories distributed in universities with an aim to provided unified access to theses and dissertations through its harvesting server.

Shodhganga replicates academic structure of each University in terms of Departments/ Centres/ Colleges each University has to facilitate ease of navigation. This structure facilitates research scholars from universities to deposit their theses in the respective Department / Centre / College. As shown in the Fig 1, option for simple search and advance search are available on the home page along with browsing facility through universities and departments. The Centre is also developing a semantic web-based interface to facilitate subject-based browsing, navigation, search and retrieval of content available in the repository.

 

Daily Reading

 About INFED

Most of the publishers use IP filtering as a de facto standard for authenticating authorized users in subscribing institutions and providing access to e-resources to them. While IP-based access is most convenient, safe and hassle-free authentication mechanism for publishers as well as for subscribing institutions, it has some limitations. One of the most serious limitation of IP-filtered access to e-resources is that the users can access e-resources only when they are in the Institute campus. Ideally, an authorized user should be able to access e-resources irrespective of his / her physical location at any time as long as he has access to the Internet.

In order to overcome this limitation, the INDIAN Access Management Federation (INFED) has adopted Shibboleth, a standard-based open source software, for authenticating authorized users from institutions and provide them seamless access to e-resources from anywhere, anytime. Shibboleth offers a mechanism for users to access multiple resources within a federated single sign-on framework. The goal of the INFED is to allow users to access internal and external resources seamlessly using a single, institutionally controlled identity. This would not only allow authorized users to access e-resources from anywhere, anytime but would also circumvent the requirement of maintaining multiple passwords for multiple resources in multiple domains.

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InfiStats: Usage Statistics Portal for e-Resource

 The InfiStats Usage Statistics Portal is developed by INFLIBNET Centre for monitoring the usage statistics of various e-resources made accessible to the member institutes under e-Shodh Sindhu Consortium. The InfiStats harvests the COUNTER Usage for members through SUSHI Protocol. The InfiStats portal imports the usage data from the publisher's website. The InfiStats interface provides journal title level usage to member institutes. The member institutions can also login to this portal for monitoring the usage of their respective e-resources that are available to them through central funding. The portal also provides an option to include the usage for self-subscribed resources by the member institutions and monitor from the InfiStats portal.

To set up Infistats for monitoring usage statistics of e-resources subscribed by your institute, please register on eSS Online e-Requisition System. Registered members of e-Shodh Sindhu can directly Login to InfiStats from eSS Online e-Resource Requisition System portal by visiting the "Subscribed Resources" Tab.

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Background

The Project entitled "National Library and Information Services Infrastructure for Scholarly Content (N-LIST)", being jointly executed by the e-ShodhSindhu Consortium, INFLIBNET Centre and the INDEST-AICTE Consortium, IIT Delhi provides for i) cross-subscription to e-resources subscribed by the two Consortia, i.e. subscription to INDEST-AICTE resources for universities and e-ShodhSindhu resources for technical institutions; and ii) access to selected e-resources to colleges. The N-LIST project provides access to e-resources to students, researchers and faculty from colleges and other beneficiary institutions through server(s) installed at the INFLIBNET Centre. The authorized users from colleges can now access e-resources and download articles required by them directly from the publisher's website once they are duly authenticated as authorized users through servers deployed at the INFLIBNET Centre.

N-LIST: Four Components

The project has four distinct components, i.e. i) to subscribe and provide access to selected e-ShodhSindhu e-resources to technical institutions (IITs, IISc, IISERs and NITs) and monitor its usage; ii) to subscribe and provide access to selected INDEST e-resources to selected universities and monitor its usage; iii) to subscribe and provide access of selected e-resources to Govt./ Govt.-aided colleges and monitor its usage; and iv) to act as a Monitoring Agency for colleges and evaluate, promote, impart training and monitor all activities involved in the process of providing effective and efficient access to e-resources to colleges.

The INDEST and UGC-INFONET are jointly responsible for activity listed at i) and ii) above. The INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar is responsible for activities listed at iii) and iv) above. The INFLIBNET Centre is also responsible for developing and deploying appropriate software tools and techniques for authenticating authorized users.

Note: From Year 2014, N-LIST programme is subsumed under e-ShodhSindhu Consortium as college component. The colleges (except Agriculture, Engineering, Management, Medical, Pharmacy, Dentistry and Nursing) in India are eligible to get access e-resources under N-LIST programme.