Modern technologies should appropriately be blended with government developmental programmes.India is an agrarian country with about 72 per cent (about 80 Crores) of its population in about 5,75,936 villages, the villages are inhibited by the rural poor with agriculture as their predominant occupation.They are largely small and marginal farmers, agricultural labourers, artisansand scheduled castes and scheduled tribes. A large number of rural people (about 30 crore) are still living below the poverty line and often face thebasic problem of survival, viz., jobs, poverty, hunger, shelter, ill-health and disease.

The most important ingredient for “Preparedness”.Unless we are “fully” prepared, we cannot have good and timely
response. And, to be fully prepared with good coordinates is in the
hands of geodesists, surveyors, map or chart makers, and all others,
who generate data. In turn, correct and accurate “Good Coordinates”
and quick and timely advice will strengthen the hands of the country’s
leaders, civil and/or military.If anything is lacking in good
coordinates, “We” would be failing with no room for any excuse(s).

As the GPS surveying techniques started showing promise of high accuracy geodetic positioning in the early 1990s, few “open-minded” geodesists realized the possibility of using ellipsoidal heights in place of orthometric heights. Many conceptual approaches were mentioned and proposed in various applications. However, Steinberg and Papo were the fi rst to publish a paper entitled “Ellipsoidal Heights: The Future of Vertical Geodetic Control” (GPS World, Vol. 9, No. 2, 1998). As could be expected, Petr Vanicek, a geodesy professor, was quick to downplay the proposed new “type” of vertical control (GPS World, Vol. 9, No. 4, 1998). It seems that Steinberg and Papo did not “defend” their new proposal. Thus, in this paper, a review has been made to check and comment on Vanicek’s example against the ellipsoidal heights, reference to orthometric islands, and issuance of a warning for non-dissemination of ellipsoidal heights to Canadian users.

The Great Trigonometrical Survey of India was completed in 19th century under leadership of the great surveyors- Lambton and Sir George Everest. It is inconsistent and inadequate. Accuracy of the network is only of the 1st order or less. First order was defined as better than only 1 in 50,000 only. Reference surface and Datum- The Everest Spheroid was given by Sir George Everest in 1830. Center of Everest Spheroid is about a km away from the center of gravity of the Earth; hence it is non-geocentric. Thus it is inaccurate and unsuitable under present circumstances. Leveling network of India has inconsistencies. Gravity observations were not carried out and not taken in to consideration. It was not appropriately adjusted. Indian Absolute Gravity Datum does not exist. Absolute gravimeters have not yet been used to define Gravity Datum in India. Topographical maps are on Polyconic projection. Assumptions and approximations accepted make it a non-projection. The earth is assumed to be fiat and there are no distortions of any kind. The projection has created problems in digitization, compilation and integration of maps. Design of the Grid adopted in India is not satisfactory. Distortion at central parallel is 1 in 824, which is quite high. There is archaic Restriction policy, which is not transparent and hinders research and development India has to make a choice between chaos and development. These problems have been discussed in detail in this paper. How India should go about to establish new geodetic infrastructure for systematic development and research, has been described in this paper.

Conventionally, the potential difference between two points P and Q located on the Earth’s surface are determined by gravimetry and levelling (Heiskanen and Moritz 1967), the drawback of which is that it is almost impossible to connect these two points in the case that they are located on two continents, because it is well known that the potential surface of the mean sea level (MSL) is not an equipotential surface. In another aspect, if given the gravity data on the Earth’s surface, one might determine the potential difference between two points by using the Stokes method or Molodensky method (ibid). In this case the potential field is determined and consequently the potential difference between two arbitrary points could be determined.

The Indian ionosphere is characterized by large horizontal gradients, intense irregularities, large dayto- day variations and equatorial anomaly conditions, there is clear necessity to thoroughly understand the ionospheric time delay effects on the GPS signals. The ionospheric delay error is a function of Total electron content (TEC) which is one of the dominant errors.
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The Mix up of “X, Y, Z” Coordinates Between Photogrammetry and Geodesy
In Spatial considerations –
In geodesy, the “ZXY” coordinate system is “right-handed”, where the right thumb points towards the Z-axis, index finger towards the intersection of the Reference Meridian and Equatorial planes, and middle ?nger or the positive Y-axes, which is …

1. Spheroid is considered equivalent to an ellipsoid.
2. The longitude at the North or South Pole is zero degree.
3. The Mean Sea Level (MSL), a time-variant “average”, is
considered as time-invariant and time-independent.
4. The measured “dn” along a spirit level loop sum up to zero.
5. Imagine a freely ?owing ocean or sea channel under
a continent and it represents the Geoid.
6. The geoidal undulation or height (N) is equivalent to orthometric height (H).
7. There are “yours” and “mine” geoids. In other words every country has its
own geoid, creating a “political” boundary value problem for gravity.
8. When one has to re-observe at any station, it does not make any
difference so long one is observing within “few” meters.
9. If one asks for and gets a height as “123.4 m”. It is OK to add
zeros at the end, e.g., 123.4000, to make it more accurate.

Space environmental effects on satellite communication can be considered as related to space segment, ground segment and on the signals propagating through the earth’s lower and upper atmosphere. The atmospheric structure has significant influence on signal propagation. This has definite influence on the data processing methodologies. The specific applications with which are concerned here are …

The Coordinates Class room espouse readers to graticules of Mathematics and Physics that epitomize the Geospatial Information Technology. A chain of structured presentations related to interdisciplinary principles that define Geodesy, GPS, GIS, Geospatial data management and Image processing are to be en suite in this section in each issue of the Coordinates. Initially the chain …