I was a part of a team at #IIRS #Dehradun, which developed the #Biodiversity #Information #System #BIS. During my stay, I #collaborated with several #researchers and came up with a #few #publications which do have some #citations according to my #Google #Scholar profile.
During my stay at #IIRS Dehradun, I learnt that #ISRO has always been taking the #leading #position in #geospatial #research and #training, and #applying the same on the #field for #cartography and #decision #support. Further, the #Indian #Institutes of #Technology #IIT were also maintaining a constant and healthy competition in the research, mostly at #masters and #doctoral #levels.
In the year 2007, I was on a #train #journey to Hyderabad, and was reading a #book titled "Remote Sensing and Image Interpretation" by #Lillesand and #Kiefer. A couple of #passengers asked me as to what my #occupation was. I told them that I was a PhD scholar at the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur #iitkanpur #IITK. To their inquiry as to what was the domain of my research, I told them it was #geoinformatics . They probed a bit more, and I told them that I worked with #aerialsurvey #techniques such as #LiDAR and before IITK, I was working with #remotely #sensed images from #satellites (#remotesensing). Incidentally, the responses of the passengers told me that they had no idea that such kinds of research was going on in India. I was pretty much #disappointed with their #reactions. "Perhaps there is less #awareness!", I thought so to myself and continued reading.
It is 2022 now. India is discussing its #Geospatial #Policy. At the same time, I came to know about a #comment made by a pretty #senior #academic, that "#Geology is the same as Geoinformatics". Therefore the question "from 2007 to 2022, did the public awareness about Geospatial Technology change?" Essentially such comments are pretty #dangerous, too #generic and #irresponsible. It is imperative that #geospatial #researchers in India, organise a #large #awareness programme pan India to spread the knowledge about geospatial technology and its large scale benefits.
Before ending, I would like to stress that Geoinformatics and any of #geology, #geometry, #differentialgeometry, #geotechnicalengineering, #geostatistics, #geophone, #geodesy, #geographicinformationsystems, #geodesics are NOT the same, albeit that they may have mutual overlaps at some places!
#education #change #india
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