By Arun Kumar Shrivastav
The Union Budget for 2023-24 is the first budget of what Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government describes as Amrit Kaal, the period between the 75th and 100th anniversary of India’s independence when the country will take rapid strides to modernize itself. A major component of this transformation is strengthening the concept of Digital India, which is targeted at achieving ease of doing business and ease of living.
In line with these objectives, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman proposed several initiatives. The budget allocates Rs 4,795.24 crore for the Digital India program. Under the Digital India campaign, the first focus area is agriculture which will see investments in developing open-source digital infrastructure. Agriculture-related startups providing digital solutions in rural areas will find support from an agriculture accelerator fund that the government announced in the budget it plans to set up.
Digitization of the cooperative sector and the creation of a national cooperative database is the next focus area as per the budget. It will bring all cooperative societies under one umbrella where all information about them is available. Given the large-scale irregularities in the cooperative sector and the harm, it does to development initiatives at the grassroots level, bringing transparency in the cooperative societies can be a game-changer. Going ahead with the Digital India vision, the budget proposes to set up a national digital library focused on children and adolescents.
The government also plans to set up three centers of excellence in educational institutions for the study and research of Artificial Intelligence. A national data governance policy and simplification of KYC data are also on the cards. PAN will take the center stage as a common identifier for Digital India initiatives. Engineering institutions will see 100 new labs set for developing 5G applications. Digitization of court proceedings including streaming will get a further boost in Phase III of e-courts.
The government’s allocation for the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology is Rs 16,549 crore, 40% higher compared to the previous financial year. Out of this, Rs 3,000 crore has been allocated to the Indian Semiconductor Mission, which intends to create a basic infrastructure and ecosystem for semiconductor and display manufacturing.
Although inadequate, the budgetary allocations to develop digital infrastructure in different fields including agriculture, judicial, and cooperatives, combined with the focus on setting up infrastructure with a long-term vision to make India a leading player in the manufacturing of critical electronic components such as semiconductors and displays, are sure to make some buzz in these sectors. What holds the key is the continued budgetary support to these sectors over a period. Since this is the fifth and final budget of the current government, a lot depends on how future governments take these initiatives forward. India would be going to the general elections in May 2024.
A few days before the budget, the government set up a task force to steer India’s G20 digital transformation outreach. Infosys’s executive chairman Nandan Nilekani who as the chief architect of India’s unique identification for every citizen pioneered the concept of Adhaar has been made the co-chair of the task force along with former NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant. India has made some remarkable gains in the way it uses digital solutions for everyday needs and problems. For example, the instant digital payments system UPI processed over 7 billion transactions in 2022, making everyday payments so much easy for its large population. Through the G20 Digital Transformation taskforce, India wants to offer these solutions to countries that need them. Thanks to UPI, India accounts for 40% of global digital payments. In this respect, it has left behind many developed countries including its arch-rival China.
This has been possible due to the 12-digit unique biometric-based identification system, Aadhaar, which combined with other electronic identities such as smartphones which more than a billion Indians hold today, create a robust application processing interface infrastructure that enables UPI-like systems to work flawlessly.
Take, for example, India’s Covid-19 vaccination program. Through a single website CoWin, the country was able to register 110 crore people and administer 220 crore vaccine dosages in a time-bound manner without any duplication or major glitch. It turned out that India’s fight against Covid-19 was far better than many developed countries with the highly advanced healthcare system. Through the G20 Digital Taskforce, India, which is holding the presidency of this powerful economic block of 19 countries and the 27-member European Union, plans to take these solutions to other countries. Last month, Nandan Nilekani at a Microsoft event in Bengaluru told its CEO Satya Nadella that “India has reached only halfway on its digital journey and the big vision is how to create a digital-first economy and society, leveraging the power of modern tech to improve lives of people, bring more equitable, more inclusive, open access and allow people to use their own data to move forward.” (IPA Service)
