NEW DELHI: An open data ecosystem will impact India’s GDP by $22 billion, or the equivalent of two times the amount raised through the sale of 4G spectrum in 2017, according to a study by Yes Bank along with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY). The study, titled 'Open Government, Open Data – Re-imagining India,’ claims that an open data ecosystem has the power to double farmers income by 2022 , provide Universal Health coverage and provide microloans to three million plus micro, small and medium enterprises among other benefits.
The study however, points out underlying execution gaps of the Open Data project which have restricted its use and recommends steps which will boost data driven governance architecture.
Rana Kapoor, MD and CEO, Yes Bank, said that the steps to digitise and share Open Government Data (OGD) are of paramount importance. “Firstly, data is collected from citizens for citizen welfare and should therefore be shared with them. Secondly, data like Government budget usage, welfare schemes and subsidies increases transparency, thereby building greater trust.” He added that it paves the way for developing technology-led innovations centered on data which can unlock massive economic value, especially for the ‘bottom of the pyramid’ consumers.
India was one of the first to set up the OGD platform in India at data.gov.in to provide access to data sets published by Government departments across
Areas such as agriculture, banking, economy, industrial air pollution, telecom, etc. The portal currently hosts 1.6 lakh+ resources from 109 government departments and 33 sectors, one of the largest globally.
But to increase its usage which is less as compared to countries such as Australia, the report recommends steps such as Completeness of Data Stacks opened for usage either through machine readable formats or direct APIs. Moreover, emerging technologies like Blockchain and IoT, can help in automating data collection and reducing manual intervention and therefore the chances of error. It also recommends “Comprehensiveness” of a data stack and “Clustering” of relevant data sets along with building of anchor cases to encourage usage of data.
“The formation of an Open Data council comprising of private sector reps from key sectors, PSU reps, technology service providers and chaired by MeitY would build on the foundation of market use cases by facilitating identification of Priority Sectors for subsequent Data Digitization and API Creations as well as promotion of the portal and building market usage,” said the report recommending partnerships with 100 private sector companies or public sector enterprises to promote data usage.
Source: economictimes.indiatimes.com