The UI Dev

Telecom News:             The National Informatics Centre (NIC) will carry out the GIS mapping of the existing Optical Fibre Cable (OFC) network of the telecom operators such BSNL, Rail Tel, Power Grid, etc. The mapping of the existing OFC will enable to calculate the incremental length of the cable required for connecting all the 2.5 lakh panchayats with OFC. The cost of initial phase of the NOFN scheme is likely to be in the region of Rs 20,000 crore.             The government of India has approved the creation of National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN) for providing broadband connectivity of all panchayats. The plan is to extend the existing optical fibre network initially upto panchayats by utilizing the Universal Services Obligation Fund (USOF) and creating an institutional mechanism for management and operation of the NOFN for ensuring non discriminatory access to all se...

            A GIS application has been designed to help the Chennai Corporation and the departments concerned to take quick decisions when a major earthquake strikes the city. The application has been prepared based on data collected as part of the seismic vulnerability screening of over 50,000 buildings with more than three floors by the civic body in association with the Centre for Disaster Mitigation and Management, Anna University. However, buildings in the defence areas were not covered in the seismic vulnerability screening.            The civic body has started taking measures towards providing the GIS application to other agencies such as Fire and Rescue Services, Police and Home Guards. The GIS application could be used to find out if any of the residential or commercial buildings with three of more storeys are safe when an earthquake strikes. The number of build...

          For the first time in India, Manipur has introduced Geographic Information System (GIS) for mapping schools located in remote areas of the State.  The GIS was launched by the State with technical support from Delhi based Mission of Geo-Spatial Application which is an agency of the Central Government.           Using the GIS, State Mission Authority of the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan scheme has undertaken a mapping exercise of 4640 Primary and Upper Primary schools located in different parts of the State. In addition to mapping 4640 schools, the same exercise has identified 1093 different places where there is no school and in need of schools.          Since the implementation of the Right to Education Act in India which lays down that schools should be located within a specific distance from human settlement areas, the need for using...

          India is mapping out its newest national asset, a state-of-the art online information bank, which promises to transform governance, aid planning and make life easier for the man on the street. Called National GIS, this geographical information system powered service would be the first one-stop database of India's natural and physical assets, providing information and services about government schemes and businesses -- right from locating malls, hospitals or ATMs to lodging complaints.           The locational data service, expected to be fully operational in 3 years, would be accorded the status of a national asset and can accessed through desktops or mobiles. National GIS, which is expected to help boost productivity and keep a check on wasteful expenditure, will have a "citizen layer" that will make it possible for individuals to geographically tag complaints and grievances...

            The Punjab government is all set to implement ultra modern GIS systems in 6 big cities of Punjab namely Amritsar, Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Patiala, Batinda and Pathakot to facilitate future planning, expansion and maintenance of civic infrastructure in these cities. The GIS will be implemented in these cities by October 31, 2011, which would be further implemented in other districts of the state.             Complete information of these cities will be available on the GIS which should prove beneficial and helpful during the preparation of "Master Plans" of these cities in the future. The satellite images of these cities will be taken which would later on be developed to form a large database. The maps that will be generated would provide detailed information on roads and rail networking along with exact locations of bus stops and railway stations. The maps will also s...

           A bunch of Twitter users have come together to gather information about power cuts in India and make an infographic map to map the geographical spread of power cuts across the country.            It all started when Shefaly Yogendra, a London-based investment consultant, saw a discussion on power cuts on her Twitter timeline and suggested to her friends, "May be you guys should tweet #powercut with location. The infographic will highlight the need for investment. To many people." The idea caught on. Users had begun writing about the time and location of the power cuts in their respective areas with the hashtag #powercutindia. Ajay Kumar, a software engineer, put up a web page that had started mapping power cuts in the country on the basis of the tagged tweets. Now the page can be accessed at http://powercuts.in . A Twitter account by the name of @PowerCutsIn has also been employed to co...

            A specialized institution, Indian National GIS Organization, will be set up, probably within a year, to provide an independent view on progress of existing projects and the need for new projects. The idea of having a central GIS body consisting of nation-wide GIS assets and application services to provide inputs for better decision making was floated by the Plan panel, which has set up a committee of experts headed by secretary of earth sciences ministry, Shailesh Nayak, to prepare the framework of National GIS body to be set up in a public-private partnership mode.             The body will help ministries such as environment, water resources, urban & rural development to integrate satellite- based technology with the infrastructure creation process. The GIS inputs will be valuable for long-term planning and will provide real time insight to the Centre before taking a decision. ...

                The first Coral Atlas of the State, prepared by the Gujarat Ecology Commission was released on Saturday, April 30, 2011. The Atlas, which maps corals along the state’s 1,660-km coastline, throws new light on the existence of corals in areas outside the Gulf of Kutch, notably off the coasts of Valsad and scattered areas off Saurashtra. The Atlas is based on thematic maps of the Coral reefs and reveals the latest figures on the reefs. The Atlas not only gives figures for the coral reefs in the state but also gives details of the habitat scenario of each of these reefs. The Atlas has been prepared with technical assistance from Bhaskaracharya Institute for Space Application and Geo-Informatics (BISAG), after the maps were procured from the National Remote Sensing Agency (NRSA). The Atlas is a baseline study and much more work could be carried out on mapping of corals, especially those found for ...

         The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) will undertake a mapping of mosquitoes in Orissa, India using a Geographic Information System (GIS). The proposed GIS mapping of vectors is aimed at evolving a common strategy to fight all vector-borne diseases at one go. ICMR aims to complete the exercise before monsoon when mosquito breeding goes up. Once done for Orissa, similar exercises will be undertaken in other states as well. Besides RMRC, Vector Control Research Centre, Puducherry, and National Malaria Research Institute, Delhi, in collaboration with the Orissa state government will be a part of this exercise.          While different vectors cause dengue, malaria, filaria and chikungunya, separate programmes are undertaken to control these diseases, resulting in duplication of efforts and resources. However, if all vectors of a particular location are known, one common programme can be desig...

         The election commission of India will install web-based GIS in West Bengal's polling booths to help the State Chief Electoral Officer track them on their web site. The system will provide a map showing the exact spatial location of all 51919 polling booths and nearby landmarks, with their latitudinal and longitudinal coordinates. Boundaries of the parliamentary and assembly constituencies of the booths, along with all the administrative boundaries will also be provided in the GIS-based map.          The software will give a 360-degree view of the entire area falling within the 200-meter radius of each polling booth, including approach roads and nearby installations. It will show every detail of the polling station, such as the number of voters, number of polling and security personnel deployed, details about the current law and order situation and reports of past violence or disturbance in the are...

          The Uttar Pradesh State Water and Sanitation Mission (SWSM) will soon be documenting the drinking water resources across six zones of the state. These zones are Allahabad, Ghaziabad, Gorakhpur, Lucknow, Varanasi and Moradabad. The documentation - to be done through Geographical Information System (GIS) and Global Positioning System (GPS) mapping - will take note of ponds (manmade and natural), wells and handpumps. This exercise which is a part of the National Rural Drinking Water Programme (NRDWP) will help the officials to create a proper database of these resources, which will be used for their management.          Through the mapping, all the details of all the resources will be compiled, complete with their longitude and latitude dimensions. The department plans to start off the exercise by April 1, 2011 and should end by March 31, 2012. The focus will initially be on villages where the ...

         How about keeping a digital watch on the chopping of trees in the narrow lanes of Ahmedabad? Great for sure, would say tree-lovers and environmentalists. And the great idea might soon turn into reality as the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC), Gujarat University (GU) and the state forest department have geared up to establish an electronic database after the first ever tree census in Ahmedabad.          The initial idea is to get a concrete figure on the tree population in Ahmedabad as presently there are only some estimations and random surveys with speculative figures of the number of trees. The proposed tree census is supposed to start from the first week of May this year.          While the census would be carried out manually, Global Positioning Sysytem (GPS) and Geographic Information System (GIS) would be put in place to get an electronic databa...

         The Delhi Metro's showcase Airport Express Corridor, connecting the Indira Gandhi International Airport to the heart of the Delhi, was rolled out for the public on the 23rd of February, 2011.          This is the first line in India to be mapped on GIS to enhance safety, maintenance and traffic regulation. Mapping the corridor on GIS will help in mobilising emergency services in case of a blast or fire on the train. Delhi Airport Metro Express Private Limited, the company operating the line, has mapped all the emergency services, including fire stations, police stations, hospitals, etc. along the alignment.

          Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), Karnataka, has embarked upon an ambitious project of mapping nearly 74,000 educational institutions, including junior colleges, in the State using the geographical information system (GIS) to bolster education by making best use of school infrastructure and to facilitate planning and development.           Karnataka is the fourth State after Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat and Chhattisgarh to go for electronic mapping of schools, including aided and unaided schools. There are about 46,000 primary schools, 12,000 primary aided schools and 16,000 high schools and junior colleges in the State.           The GIS mapping of schools in the State may be taken up on the model developed in Andhra Pradesh. The GIS software developed in Andhra Pradesh is being customised by the National Informatics Centre for storing, ...

          Mumbai's Metro rail system, which is scheduled to take off by next year, will have a Geographic Information System (GIS) for mapping the entire rail tracks and nearby areas to enhance safety, maintenance and traffic regulation. Mumbai Metro One Pvt. Ltd. (MMOPL) - the special purpose vehicle promoted by Reliance Infrastructure, Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) and French multinational firm Veolia - is implementing the GIS along the Versova-Andheri-Ghatkopar (VAG) corridor in Phase-I of the project. This is a first-of-its-kind initiative in the country for Metro rail management.           The GIS system will map the exact location of the trains and all emergency services, including fire stations, police stations and hospitals along the alignment. In case there is a fire incident or other emergencies, the exact location of the nearest fire station or po...

         In a bid to check the rising incidents of poaching and keep an eye on the flora and fauna of the two sanctuaries in Madhya Pradesh, the government has decided to use satellite to monitor the Chambal and Palpur Kuno region.          The basic field technique, which is used currently, to maintain a log of the region’s vegetation, wildlife does not give the real time data. Therefore, the government has decided to use the Geographical Information System (GIS) Global Positioning System (GPS) for the purpose.          Madhya Pradesh’s leading animal scientist Dr. RJ Rao, who has received training in such satellite monitoring of national reserves from California, said the program ‘ARC Q-9’ is proving to be of great use in protection of the wildlife. They have used the program to prepare a database of the whole Chambal and Kuno region, said Rao. Sourc...

          The Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik dedicated ‘Odisha Sampad’ a Web-based Block GIS Atlas developed by the Orissa Space Application Centre (ORSAC) to the people of the state on 4 January.           The objective of ‘Odisha Sampad’ is to provide datasets of all the 314 blocks (village-wise) of the state relating to natural resources, environment, infrastructure, socio-economic and demography. The information content has been built on the basis of satellite image interpretation, survey at the block level and maps of other departments and agencies. The web atlas contains information on natural resources like land, utilization distribution of wastelands, forest lands, agriculture area, plantation, settlement, waterbodies etc.           It also contains information on soil, slope, lithology, drainage, geomorphology, ground water potenti...

          An archaeological team, led by T M Keshava from Bangalore, discovered maps that date back to 1500-2000 BC. The place is located around Tungabhadra River near Hampi in Karnataka, India. Unlike modern maps that rely on technology, ancient men banked on their eyesight and memory.           The map was depicted on the roof of caves of Chikramapura village. What was once thought to be a megalithic burial site with just paintings of animals and humans; is proof of the prehistoric man’s cartographic skill. Keshava’s finding is believed to be the first-ever aerial map of a region drawn by a prehistoric man. While paintings of animals such as cows, hunting scenes and human figurines are common across pre-historic settlements, only the Chikramapura village caves, also called Kadebagilu rock shelters, feature maps.           “A previous stu...

         The police have adopted a novel method to track down criminals involved in crime in and around Patna with the introduction of Geographic Information System (GIS) by the state police headquarters.          The system which is being manned round the clock by 5 SIs and 2 dozen constables, has so far yielded tangible results, Patna City SP Manu Maharaj said. He is himself monitoring the entire new system.          The new system had helped the police in detecting and solving about 50 cases in Patna during the past 18 months. The GIS is so sensitive that police can locate criminals' hideouts . With the help of GIS, Patna police have been able to arrest about 11,020 criminals between July 2009 and November 2010. During raids at criminals' hideouts with the help of GIS, police seized about 397 illegal weapons, 6,592 live cartridges, 72 magazines, 81 live bombs and Rs 32....

Vietnam, India ink deal to develop GIS technologies:           A delegation from the Vietnamese Ministry of Science and Technology has signed deal with India for the deployment of GIS technologies. The GIS deal aims to spot areas vulnerable to droughts in service of agriculture and forestry and extracting substances from starfish in service of the pharmaceutical industry. To  know more visit the source of the news. Shoreline maps of Gujarat and Puducherry released:           Jairam Ramesh, Minister of State for Environment and Forests (I/C) launched the shoreline study maps of Gujarat and Puducherry. These maps are approved by the respective state governments. The coastline of India is undergoing changes due to various anthropogenic and natural interventions. Most of the shoreline chanes are on account of the structures which have been developed/ constructed along the foreshore of the...