Open government data, adopting international standards, and responsible data sharing will go a long way towards unlocking India's potential, as per a recent meeting of the Data Taskforce constituted by the Union Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY).
MeitY's National E-governance Division (NeGD) recently conducted an ‘AI Pe Charcha’ session on data for artificial intelligence. The meeting was chaired by NeGD President and CEO Abhishek Singh, and was also attended by Fractal, CivicDataLap=bs and ARTPARK, a press release by NASSCOM on Thursday, December 22 stated.
The Data Taskforce was jointly formed by NASSCOM and MeitY, along with Fractal, Microsoft, Infosys, IDFC Institute, TCS, and Amazon, with Fractal's Group CEO Srikanth Velamakanni serving as its chair.
According to NASSCOM, India’s open data efforts are amplifying, and so is the potential of AI and other data-based emerging technologies to create large-scale social transformation. "However, often these technologies require access to detailed datasets not available under open access. Considering this, the government is also focusing on efforts to strengthen the overall data ecosystem," the release read.
"Some of the key recommendations suggested by the group include: Making open government data a policy priority; apply reasonable data classification policies to avoid the over-classification of data, adoption of international standards and tools, create regulatory sandboxes and allow for responsible testing of data sharing approaches and provide non- binding guidance through regulators on how existing regulations apply in data sharing contexts," the release stated.
“Given the government’s demonstrated commitment to ensure secure access to quality datasets, I am certain that relevant stakeholders across the open data ecosystem will find immense value in the insights presented in this report," NeGD's Singh said.
NASSCOM said in its release that an integrated data utilisation strategy can add $450-500 billion to India’s GDP by 2025. "This requires cautious utilisation of datasets ... help in policy-making, create new and high-quality jobs."
The group in its recommendation has also advised for creating transparent, standardised, and risk-based data classification guides along with model data sharing framework to mitigate challenges impacting datasets usability thereby hindering its potential growth, Nasscom said.
“Data is a strategic asset that has immense potential to drive innovation in today’s AI-enabled world. The government of India has millions of datasets fuelled by unprecedented pace of digitisation and digital penetration at India’s population scale. This has put us in a unique position to leverage this data to catalyse inclusive growth, research and transform public service delivery," Velamakanni said.
