Department of Library and Information Science Alumni, Aligarh Muslim University: International Open Access Week

Report

Prof. Shabahat Husain inaugurates the program

Dr. Naushad Ali, Program co-ordinator

OVERVIEW

International Open Access Week, the annual event celebrating the global movement towards Open Access (OA) to research and scholarship, kicks off for the fifth time on Monday, October 24. Coordinated by SPARC and organized by more than 2,000 advocates in countries around the world, the event provides an opportunity to learn about the benefits of Open Access, share new ideas and strategies, and inspire wider participation in establishing Open Access as the norm in scholarly communication.

INAUGURATION

A panel discussion on Open Access Movement on the auspicious of International Open Access Week was organized by the Department of Library and Information Science, Aligarh Muslim University got off with recitation from the holy Quran. Dr. Naushad Ali P.M, Programme Coordinator and Chairman of the Department of Library and Information Science gave an introduction about the open access movement and its 5^th celebration of International Open Access Week from 24^th to 30^th October 2011.

Prof. Shabahat Husain, Librarian-in-Charge, Maulana Azad Library, AMU inaugurated the panel discussion. During the inaugural speech Prof. Shabahat Husain called upon all the departments in the university to create departmental repositories carrying the publication of faculties and research scholars. He appreciated the efforts made by the Department holding such a wonderful discussion on such a novel theme of the time. He further stated that the Department should take initiative to congregate the publication of teachers of the department and put it on institutional repository on open access mode. For the benefit of larger community, he also demanded to take effort in creating repository of the publication of the whole academic staff of the University. He also mentioned the endeavor he had taken to download more than 2 lakhs e-books in Maulana Azad Library and to inform the faculty members of the University to utilize the opportunity during the e-book fair at free of cost.

Before handing over the podium to the discussion, Programme Coordinator and Chairman of the Department Dr. Naushad Ali P.M proudly announced that the Department will soon release an Intuitional repository of publication of teachers of Aligarh Muslim University under the name “Knowledge Garden”. He further informed that the Department could download more than one hundred e-theses related to library and information field during the fair.

PANEL DISCUSSION

The panel discussion aimed to provide a platform to discuss and share different aspects of open access and its issues and challenges in the present era. Dr. Sudharma Haridasan, Associate Professor, took the lead playing the role of moderator of the discussion. The panelists were Mr. Shibu K M, Guest Faculty, Department of Library and Information Science, Mr. Mohamed Musthafa K, Mr. Jafar Iqbal, Mr. Sheikh Imran Mr. Muzamil Mushtaq and Mrs. Shazia Khan, Research Scholars of Department of Library and Information Science.

At the outset of the discussion Dr. Sudharma Haridasan invited Mr. Sheikh Imran for the discussion. During his speech he demanded the academic community to negotiate with the publishing industry to retain a certain portion of the copy right so that the author would be in position to publish his or her scholar output on open access mode.

Mr. Jafar Iqbal briefly presented the concept of open access, its development, ways to achieve open access and some of the international and national level contributions to open access. He further stated the open access is a one of the powerful tool to increase the citation of the scholarly publication and listed some of the institutes which are already accepted open access policy in their publications.

Mrs. Shazia Khan concentrated to disclose the issues related to Quality assurance of the open access publications. She has mentioned some measures and ways out to resolve and improve the qualities of the open access publication. Mr. Muzamil Mushtaq strived to bring out the both the positive and negative aspects of the open publishing mode. Mr. Mohamed Mustafa K stated some of the issues related to the open access publishing. He argued that open access will not replace traditional publishing industry, instead both would go simultaneously. He further said that open source is a flow and it will go on in the coming future also.

Mr. Shibu K M started his talk with a famous saying of Adam Smith “A good supply of water would not develop a city” but a good supply of information would develop the country. He marvelously presented the concept of open access and its both roads of pubishing viz Gold and Green roads. He further raised the wind by blowing the issues in open access like peer review problem, quality, psychological fear of loosing intellects etc.

Moderator Dr. Sudharma Hardisan comprehending the discussion saying open access has a wide application and we cannot rule out the problems of the copyright and other peer review issues. Coordinator Dr. Naushad Ali extended vote of thanks. The program brought to a close with refreshment arranged in the department.