Building International Cooperation for Trustworthy ICT

BIC Extended Working Group (EWG) launched in India, 21st May 2013

On Tuesday, 21st May, 2013, an official launch and kick off meeting was held of the first in- country Extended Working Group (EWG) of BIC, which was hosted by the Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY) of the Government of India in New Delhi.

The BIC project has been promoting a longer term structure for a more strategic multi-lateral cooperation going beyond the tactical bi-lateral approaches used to date, and for their model, there is an in-country Extended Working Group (EWG) composed of experts in all fields associated with Trustworthy ICT that have an interest in carrying out international cooperation with their peers in other countries. The main objective of the EWGs are to intensively scope the topical areas and ideas for international cooperation (INCO) projects in Trustworthy ICT and to promote these ideas to be included in the upcoming research Work Programmes (WPs). Further information on this structure can be found here.

The Government of India and Indian researchers within the International Advisory Group (IAG) of BIC have been very pro-active and have activated the first EWG and the launch and kick off meeting was held on 21st May 2013 in New Delhi in the conference hall of the Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY) of the Government of India. The launch meeting was chaired by Dr. Gulshan Rai, the Director General of Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In), Department of Electronics & IT, Ministry of Communications & IT of the Government of India. The meeting was also privileged to have a keynote address from Dr. Philippe de Taxis du Poët, Minister Counsellor – Research & Innovation, Delegation of the European Union to India. The full agenda including participants of the event can be found here.

“This is a major achievement to have India’s EWG established with such tremendous support from Department of Electronics and Information Technology of the Government of India and European Commission; The other BIC countries of Brazil and South Africa already are undertaking similar activities and they will look towards India’s model of cooperation and EWG as an exemplar”, said Mr. James Clarke, of the Waterford Institute of Technology in Ireland, the BIC coordinator, at the launch meeting.

“This achievement clearly addresses the long term strategy of BIC as it is pretty clear these structures can continue long after BIC and shows the strong commitment of the research community and government of India and their desire to cooperate with EU researchers in the upcoming Horizon 2020 programme”, according to Mr. Clarke.

The Chairman and the participants especially appreciated the Management Strategy for International Cooperation (INCO) that was presented by Mr. Abhishek Sharma, who has been working with the BIC project in the International Advisory Group (IAG) and has been the prime architect of the extended INCO strategy, advocating the need for an Extended Working Group (EWG) and Specialist Function Group (SFG) in each country in conjunction with the International Advisory Group and supporting Core Working Groups of BIC. Dr. Jaijit Bhattacharya, of HP India and Prof. IIT Delhi, especially showed appreciation for the need to have Critical Success Factors (CSF) for INCO as presented by Mr. Sharma in his presentation on Making INCO Meaningful & Effective (MIME).

Professor M. P. Gupta, Prof. and Chair of the Information Systems and Centre for Excellence in E-gov at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi, has agreed to take on the role of steering the EWG of India and his first plans are to increase membership with eminent researchers from all over India in the specific areas highlighted by the BIC project core working groups for EU cooperation with India, namely: Cyber security, Identity Management and Provisioning, Mobile and cloud computing, and Trust management.

In his closing statement, Dr. Philippe de Taxis du Poët welcomed the BIC initiative in India stating that it addressed many of the strategy reinforcing approaches towards Horizon 2020, including the reduction of fragmentation and strengthening of coordination of EU – India, including EU Member States – India collaborations, strengthening of cyber well-being and security of the citizens, increased cluster to cluster cooperation, and a strong focus on research and innovation with the inclusion of all stakeholders including academic and industry, both large and small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs).

Dr. Gulshan Rai concluded the event by stressing, “We are very supportive of the need for international cooperation, especially in the areas of cyber security, and given that both India and EU have their national cyber security strategies in place, it is in our mutual interests and extremely important for us to work closely together on these topics and these activities will enable this objective”.

A full report of the first BIC India EWG launch workshop can be found by clicking here —-> BIC DeitY EWG report final.

India EWG1

From left to right: Prof. M. P. Gupta, IIT Delhi; Mr. Abhishek Sharma, Beyond Evolution Technologies, Member BIC IAG; Prof. MM Chaturvedi, Ansal University, Member BIC IAG; Dr. Gulshan Rai, Director General CERT-In, DeitY, Member BIC IAG; Dr. Jaijit Bhattacharya, HP India and Prof. IIT Delhi; Mr. James Clarke, Waterford IT, BIC coordinator; Dr. Saurabh Singh, HP India; Mr. Sanjay Bahl, Senior Consultant CERT-In, DeitY.

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From left to right: Mr. James Clarke, Waterford IT, BIC coordinator; Dr. Gulshan Rai, Director General CERT-In, DeitY, Member BIC IAG; Dr. Philippe de Taxis du Poët, Minister Counsellor – Research & Innovation, Delegation of the European Union to India; Mr. Sanjay Bahl, Senior Consultant CERT-In, DeitY; Dr. Jaijit Bhattacharya, HP India and Prof. IIT Delhi; Dr. Saurabh Singh, HP India.

IMG_0119

From left to right: Mr. Sanjay Bahl, Senior Consultant CERT-In, DeitY; Dr. Jaijit Bhattacharya, HP India and Prof. IIT Delhi; Dr. Saurabh Singh, HP India; Prof. MM Chaturvedi, Ansal University, Member BIC IAG; Prof. M. P. Gupta, IIT Delhi.

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From left to right: Mr. Abhishek Sharma, Beyond Evolution Technologies, Member BIC IAG; Mr. James Clarke, Waterford IT, BIC coordinator.

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From left to right: Dr. Jaijit Bhattacharya, HP India and Prof. IIT Delhi;  Prof. MM Chaturvedi, Ansal University, Member BIC IAG; Mr. Abhishek Sharma, Beyond Evolution Technologies, Member BIC IAG; Mr. James Clarke, Waterford IT, BIC coordinator; Prof. M. P. Gupta, IIT Delhi;  Mr. Sanjay Bahl, Senior Consultant CERT-In, DeitY; Dr. Gulshan Rai, Director General CERT-In, DeitY, Member BIC IAG; Missing from photo: Dr. Saurabh Singh, HP India; Dr. Philippe de Taxis du Poët, Minister Counsellor – Research & Innovation, Delegation of the European Union to India; In addition, Dr. N Vijayaditya, Ex CCA & DG NIC: Govt. of India, also participated by sharing his views by sending a report.

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