Keynote presentation for South Eastern University, 10th Annual Science Research Sessions 2021, 30 November 2021 - by Rohan Samarajiva, LIRNEasia
A recent national survey showed that only 10% of Indians aged 15 and above who were employed during what they considered the most severe lockdown worked from home. 68% of respondents considered the Janata curfew and subsequent nationwide lockdown between March and May 2020 to be the most severe lockdown.
A recent national survey showed that only 20% of school-aged children who were enrolled in the formal education system received remote education during COVID-19 induced school closures. School aged children were considered those between the ages of 5 and 18.
A recent national survey showed that Internet use had more than doubled in the past four years, and that COVID-related shutdowns contributed significantly to the increased demand for connectivity. Among the aged 15-65 population, 49% said they had used the Internet, compared to only 19% of the aged 15-65 population claiming the same in late 2017. This translates to 61% of households in 2021 using the internet compared to 21% in 2017.
A detailed report on drinking water and sanitation services, containing recommendations for 18 state agencies, developed on the basis of countrywide consultations.
A detailed report on drinking water and sanitation services, containing recommendations for 18 state agencies, developed on the basis of countrywide consultations. 
LIRNEasia and ICRIER jointly released the findings of a nationally representative, 7000+ sample survey assessing access to services during COVID-19 in India. The research highlighted two distinct stories on the state of digital in India.
LIRNEasia and ICRIER will present the findings of a nationally representative survey with a 7,000+ sample across India. We explore the socio-economic impacts of COVID-19 by analyzing access to education, healthcare and work, with a focus on digital technologies.
The COVID-19 related lockdowns, mandating citizens to ‘stay at home’ brought about a host of challenges, from restricted mobility, to large scale job and income loss to disruptions in the provisions of essential services as well as education.
LIRNEasia Chair, Rohan Samarajiva speaks about the Future of Work, what role technology will play and what can be expected under a Digital Sri Lanka on the BISNOMICS Episode 112 DIGITAL – 31-OCT-2021.
An Expert Round Table discussion on “Data Protection in an Interconnected World” was held on the 28th of June 2021, as the first of a series of discussions under the theme of “Frontiers of Digital Economy”
The 2nd International Conference on ICT for Rural Development (IC-ICT RuDev) by the Centre of Research and Development on Informatics Applications and Public Communication, Ministry of Communication and Informatics of the Republic of Indonesia will be held in Jakarta during 27th -28th  October 2021.
On 19-20 October 2021, LIRNEasia Chair Rohan Samarajiva led the discussion on how digitalization and regulation can contribute to the provision of better bus services to the citizens of the Central Province of Sri Lanka. 
මූලික වශයෙන් ආපදා අවදානම අවම කිරීමේ වගකීම භාර ගත යුතු වන්නේ රජයයි. සුනාමිය ඉදිරියේ රජය අසරණ වුවද එම භූමිකාව පවරාගත හැකි වෙනත් ආයතනයක් නැති බව අපි එකල කීවෙමු. පූර්ව අනතුරු ඇඟවීමට අමතරව අනතුර සන්නිවේදන කිරීම පිළිබඳවද අවධානය යොමු කල යුතුය. පූර්ව අනතුරු ඇඟවීම් ප්‍රමාණවත් නොවේ. එමගින් ජීවිත හානිය අඩු කර ගත හැකි වුවද ජීවිකාවලට වන හානිය එමගින් වලකා ගත හැකි වන්නේ නැත.
Over the past decade, both internet penetration and digital media user base have increased substantially.
We present a dataset consisting of 3468 documents in Bengali, drawn from Bangladeshi news websites and factchecking operations, annotated as CREDIBLE, FALSE, PARTIAL or UN-CERTAIN. The dataset has markers for the content of the document, the classification, the web domain from which each document was retrieved, and the date on which the document was published. We also present the results of misinformation classification models built for the Bengali language, as well as comparisons to prior work in English and Sinhala.