Article 14 | Tiers of Alliance Membership

(1) Membership Tiers and Governance Status: Alliance Membership under OpenBharat.net is structured into two sequential tiers to prioritize active technical output over commercial prestige:

• Alliance Member (Contributor) [Gratis / Zero-Fee]: Open to eligible Start-ups, MSMEs, Open-Source Communities, and Developer Associations seeking active involvement in open-source AI, standardisation, and empirical research without paying membership dues. Admission and retention under this tier require verified and ongoing compliance with the mandatory qualification criteria set out in paragraph (3).

• Alliance Member (Technical) [Institutional Track]: Open to accredited corporate entities, specialized research labs, MSMEs, and start-ups seeking deep institutional integration into OpenBharat.net engineering and architecture tracks.

  • Prerequisite Standing: Every Alliance Member (Technical) must first qualify for, achieve, and maintain the baseline technical criteria of an Alliance Member (Contributor). Achieving Contributor status is an absolute prerequisite to obtaining or retaining Technical status.

  • Convenor Status Equivalence: The nominated institutional technical representative of an Alliance Member (Technical) shall be granted working status, review standing, and deliberative rights equivalent to that of a Technical Convenor or Policy Convenor within their designated OpenBharat.net Working Group (OWG), subject to formal ratification by the OBGC pursuant to Schedule 2 of the ISAIL Charter.

  • Institutional Commitment: Requires direct co-chairing of working sprints, continuous code contributions, compute allocation, or payment of institutional tier dues as outlined in paragraph (2).

(2) Standard Institutional Fee Schedule (Two-Year Tenure): All Alliance Memberships, whether held under the Contributor tier or the Technical tier, shall operate on a uniform baseline term of two (2) years, renewable upon review. Where an entity seeking Alliance Member (Technical) status does not secure a contribution waiver or where an entity opts for standard institutional onboarding, the following dues apply for a renewable term of two (2) years:

• Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs):

  • Micro Enterprises: ₹18,000 for a period of two (2) years.

  • Small Enterprises: ₹25,000 for a period of two (2) years.

  • Medium Enterprises: ₹45,000 for a period of two (2) years.

• Start-ups:

  • Early-Stage (Incorporated 1 to 5 years): ₹8,000 for a period of two (2) years.

  • Growth-Stage (Incorporated 5 to 10 years): ₹25,000 for a period of two (2) years, contingent upon DPIIT or statutory recognition in the domicile jurisdiction.

• Research Laboratories: ₹20,000 for a renewable block of five (5) years.

• Social Enterprises: ₹30,000 for a period of two (2) years.

• Open-Source Communities and Developer Associations: Fully exempt from all fees (Gratis Tier) for renewable two (2) year cycles, in direct recognition of their developer tooling, public codebase maintenance, and grassroots developer ecosystem mobilization.

(3) Mandatory Qualification Criteria for Alliance Member (Contributor): Any start-up or micro/small enterprise seeking admission or renewal as an Alliance Member (Contributor) without paying standard dues must satisfy all three of the following cumulative conditions:

• Technical Artifact or Empirical Baseline: The entity must have an active technical artifact, open codebase, empirical research paper, or functioning architectural prototype (including pre-prototype implementations and documented technical blueprints). Generic commercial aggregator wrappers or pure API reselling platforms devoid of native algorithmic or infrastructure depth are disqualified.

• Sustained Operational Cadence: The entity's designated representatives must actively participate in OpenBharat.net activities, OWG sprint calls, hack days, or policy deliberations on not less than five (5) distinct occasions across every six (6) to twelve (12) month cycle.

• Working Group Integration: The entity must actively join, contribute technical deliverables to, or formally co-initiate at least one (1) OpenBharat.net Working Group (OWG) under Article 5.

(4) Annual Contribution Audit and Reclassification:

• The OBGC, supported by the Secretariat, shall audit participation logs, repository commits, and OWG deliverable records annually.

• Contributor tier members that lapse on their sprint participation, deliverable commitments, or baseline activity requirements shall be given thirty (30) days' written notice to remediate compliance.

• Failure to satisfy the criteria shall result in automatic reclassification to the applicable standard institutional fee tier under paragraph (2) or revocation of Alliance Membership privileges.

(5) Review and Administrative Discretion:

• The OBGC, acting with the institutional concurrence of the ISAIL Secretariat, reserves the authority to recalibrate two-year tier thresholds, adjust fee schedules against inflation or compute laboratory operating costs, and sanction special non-monetary compute-sharing arrangements on a case-by-case basis.