Omidyar Network India and IDinsight partner with NITI Aayog to support the National Data and Analytics Platform

The National Institution for Transforming India (NITI Aayog) announced on January 23rd, 2020 a new initiative to create a National Data and Analytics Platform (NDAP) to facilitate India’s growth using data-driven discourse and policy-making. The platform will for the first time merge and standardize government datasets from across sectors, time periods, and geographies, bringing valuable data that can be easily used by policy-makers, bureaucrats, researchers, innovators, data scientists, journalists, and citizens. NDAP will combine publicly available datasets from central and state ministries, and over time will include data from surveys conducted by government agencies.

NITI Aayog has set up a Project Management Unit (PMU), with support from Omidyar Network India, which would be spearheaded by IDinsight along with Development Data Lab (DDL). IDinsight and DDL will provide technical support on data management and user needs for NDAP. The platform is expected to go live in 2021, at which time it will be available for government and external groups to access.

One of the biggest roadblocks to data-informed decision-making is a lack of up-to-date data that can be easily aggregated and analyzed. With so many groups and ministries collecting data, there is a need for defined standards and taxonomies that allow different data sets to speak to each other. For example, various departments managing urban mobility – buses, taxis, subway trains, traffic, etc. – maintain their own datasets. But to understand mobility in a city holistically and for citizens to know their best options to get from one point to another, these datasets need to be merged, analyzed, and intuitively presented on a real-time basis. There are hundreds of more such use-cases across sectors that NDAP can facilitate over time.

NDAP will aim to be a single data source with cross cutting standardized datasets and user-friendly analytics and visualization. It will initially source data from about 50 Central Government websites, including data.gov.in, and from a maximum of 250 State Government websites.

To provide data and technical support for the development of NDAP, a Technical Advisory Group (TAG) has been formed. TAG members currently include Mr Ajit Pai, Dr. Asha Subramanian, Dr. Lalitesh Katragadda, Dr. Monojit Chaudhury, Dr. Mudit Kapoor, Mr. Rajesh Chopra, Dr Samuel Asher, and Ms. Yamini Aiyar. More members will be added as the platform matures. Object Technology Solutions India Pvt. Ltd. (OTSI) has been hired as the technical vendor to build the portal with inputs from TAG and support from NITI Aayog and the PMU.

“We are seeking to address three main gaps,” said Anna Roy, who is leading this initiative within NITI Aayog. “One, all datasets are not published in a user-centric manner that is analyzable and visually presented. Two, there are a multitude of datasets out there that is leading to a lack of coherence. Finally, it’s not easy for stakeholders to find the latest datasets. The NDAP seeks to resolve these issues with a simple, interactive, visual, and robust platform that will host various Central and State Government datasets.”

“India has made tremendous progress in generating and using data for policymaking and programme implementation,” said Rajiv Kumar Vice Chairman of NITI Aayog. “It is now time to build on these efforts to further strengthen the data ecosystem. I am certain that NDAP, with its mission to be a one-stop and user-friendly data platform, will go a long way in transforming India’s data ecosystem.”

“Despite an abundance of data in India today, it is not used up to its potential,” said Ronald Abraham, IDinsight Founding Partner and PMU lead. “This limits the role data can play to foster progress in governance and socioeconomic outcomes. NDAP is not a silver bullet to address all the gaps in the data ecosystem, but it aims to address important issues around access and standardization.”