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Language, Power, and Software 293

computer scientist Harsh Kumar, has made available as freeware an
overlay for Microsoft operating systems that permits their use in a
number of Indian languages. The ironic pity here is that since
BharatBhasha is freeware, distributors have no financial motivation
to circulate it, and its use is still limited. Finally, with the advent of
Internet, literally dozens of “Internet solutions” for Indian languages
are available on the Web for free. The pity there, however, is that
most of these solutions are mutually incompatible: if you have Hindi
system A and I have Hindi system B, their coding of Hindi charac-
ters is different and we cannot communicate with each other.
In short, despite valiant and brilliant efforts to develop local
language software, their impact has been restricted. Of the major
players, only Microsoft and the Government of India have the clout
to create universally-shared standards for the Indian languages and
to build the localized software that would use them. Microsoft has
chosen to focus its efforts on distributing English language software
to the potentially large English-speaking Indian market, and, as
noted, on developing locale coding for two or more Indian languages.
The Government of India’s efforts have been dispersed in a variety of
activities, often brilliant but together not effective in creating
widely-used local language software.
The fact thus remains that the Gujerati merchant who would like
to computerize his operation so that he does not have to stay up until
midnight balancing his books can find no small business applications
except in English. The grandson from Delhi studying in London who
would like to send e-mail to his Hindi-speaking grandmother in Delhi
must do so in English or not at all. The dynamic major Indian soft-
ware firms, oriented toward exports and services, have shown little in-
terest in localization. The creative work done by many Indian
individuals and groups has so far not produced effective applications
in the major Indian languages. Even with regard to on-line Indian
newspapers, most of which are not in English, the lack of standardi-
zation is consequential. Since few newspapers share the same coding
of, for example, Hindi, for each Hindi newspaper on the Web, the Web
user must download the separate set of proprietary fonts used by that
newspaper.

Computers, Power, and Global Monoculture

In the spring of 1998, US President William Clinton spoke at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology on the Information Age. He