From 2015 to 2023: Assessing the Impact of Digital India Mission

With the Union Cabinet's resolute commitment to technological growth, the Digital India scheme has garnered extended support through a five-year expansion plan, underpinned by a substantial allocation of Rs 14,903 crore for FY2021-22 to FY2025-26. While the scheme's earlier successes have laid the foundation, the recent expansion's strategic focus on startups and its tangible impact on various sectors have generated significant interest among experts and observers alike.

As the nation embarks on the second phase of the Digital India Mission, it becomes imperative to assess the achievements of its inaugural phase. Amidst this progression, TICE engaged with industry experts to understand how Digital India's initial phase has been for Startups. Notably, leaders from the startup sphere within the digital realm have lauded the Digital India Scheme for its capacity to cultivate balanced growth and spur innovation. Further, we also highlight some key achievemnets of Digital India Mission from 2015 to 2023.

Meanwhile, if you want to know more about the expansion of Digital India Scheme, click here.

Recognized Support for Innovation

Rohan Chopra, Co-Founder of Unesync, lauds the scheme's efficacy in facilitating innovation, saying, "The Digital India scheme has shown immense efficacy within its first phase of the rollout. With the recent broadening of the budget and scope of the scheme, the scheme has opened the door for startups and MSMEs in India to innovate in budding and new-age sectors with recognized support and education." Unesync's mission, akin to the Digital India scheme, centers on accessibility to government processes and financial management, showcasing the scheme's resonance with the entrepreneurial landscape.

Digital India Initiative: A Catalyst for Startup Revolution

Puneet Dhiman, Founder, and CEO of chaabi, an upskilling platform for the blue-collar workforce, emphasizes, "The Digital India Scheme by the government helps create much-needed equitable growth opportunities for everyone. Focusing on Bharat is crucial for our future growth. The expansion in the budget will open avenues for multiple startups & MSMEs to build Bharat for the world." This sentiment captures the scheme's core essence – democratizing growth and innovation by nurturing startups beyond the urban landscape.

Digital India: Game Changer for Tier II & III Cities

Prasad Sreeram, CEO & Co-founder of COGOS, highlights, "The synergy of the enhanced Digital India expansion scheme, bolstered by increased funding and custom provisions for startups and MSMEs, marks a pivotal moment for the logistics sector. This visionary approach recognizes the transformative power of innovative startups in reshaping the industry. With amplified resources and equitable opportunities, we're poised to drive efficiency, foster employment, and play a vital role in India's economic growth while revolutionizing the logistics arena."

As we strive for a developed nation and a 10 trillion or higher economy, robust infrastructure is imperative, spanning both physical and digital realms. The Digital India program has paved the way for this transformation, exemplified by the success of UPI and Aadhar-based payment systems, he highlighted.

"Expanding this momentum to encompass AI and language support is paramount. We eagerly embrace this evolution and anticipate collaboration with startups to magnify our impact in Tier 2-3-4 towns, propelling the digital India vision forward."

Key Achievements of Digital India Mission Phase - I

The present status of some of the key initiatives undertaken by MeitY under Digital India programme across the country is as follows:

Aadhaar

• Aadhaar provides 12 digit biometric and demographic based identity that is unique, lifelong, online and authenticable. Further to give statutory backing to Aadhaar ‘The Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016’ was notified on 26^th March 2016. Over 135.5 crore residents have been enrolled.

Common Services Centres

• CSCs are offering government and business services in digital mode in rural areas through Village Level Entrepreneurs (VLEs). Over 400 digital services are being offered by these CSCs. So far, 5.21 Lakh CSCs are functional (including urban & rural areas) across the country, out of which, 4.14 Lakh CSCs are functional at Gram Panchayat level. There are 23,035 CSCs are functional in the State of Rajasthan, out of which 18823 CSCs are functional at the Gram Panchayat level.

DigiLocker

• Digital Locker provides an ecosystem with collection of repositories and gateways for issuers to upload the documents in the digital repositories. Digital Locker has more than 13.7 crore users and more than 562 crore documents are made available through DigiLocker from 2,311 issuer organisations.

Unified Mobile Application for New-age Governance (UMANG)

• UMANG for providing government services to citizen through mobile. More than 1668 e-Services and over 20,197 bill payment services are made available at UMANG.

e-Sign

• e-Sign service facilitates instant signing of forms/documents online by citizens in a legally acceptable form. The services are being leveraged by various applications using OTP based authentication services of UIDAI. More than 31.08 crore e-Sign issued by all agencies wherein, 7.01 Crore e-Sign issued by CDAC.

MyGov

• It is a citizen engagement platform that is developed to facilitate participatory governance. Presently, over 2.76+ crore users are registered with MyGov, participating in various activities hosted on MyGov platform.

MeriPehchaan

• National Single Sign-on (NSSO) platform called MeriPehchaan has been launched in July 2022 to facilitate / provide citizens ease of access to government portals. Total 4419 services of various Ministries/States integrated with NSSO.

Digital Village

• MeitY has also initiated the ’Digital Village Pilot Project” in October, 2018. 700 Gram Panchayats (GPs)/Village with atleast one Gram Panchayat/Village per District per State/UT are being covered under the project. The digital services being offered are Digital Health Services, Education Service, Financial Services, Skill Development, Solar panel powered street lights including Government to Citizens Services (G2C), Business to Citizen (B2C) Services.

National Rollout of eDistrict MMP

• e-District is a Mission Mode Project (MMP) that aims at electronic delivery of identified high volume citizen centric services at the district or sub-district level. Presently 4,671 e-services have been launched in 709 districts across India.

Open Government Data Platform

• To facilitate data sharing and promote innovation over non-personal data, Open Government Data platform has been developed. More than 5.93 lakh datasets across 12,940+ catalogues are published. The platform has facilitated 94.8 lakh downloads.

eHospital/ Online Registration System (ORS):

• e-Hospital application is the Hospital Management Information System for internal workflows and processes of hospitals. Currently, 753 Hospitals have been on-boarded on e-Hospital and ORS has been adopted by 557 hospitals across the country with over 68 lakh appointments booked from ORS.

CO-WIN 

• It is an open platform for management of registration, appointment scheduling & managing vaccination certificates for Covid-19. It has registered 110 crore persons and has facilitated administration of 220 crore doses of vaccinations.

Jeevan Pramaan

• Jeevan Pramaan envisages to digitize the whole process of securing the life certificate for Pensioner. With this initiative, the pensioner is no more required to physically present himself or herself in front of disbursing agency or the certification authority. Over 685.42lakh Digital Life certificates have been processed since 2014.

NCOG-GIS Applications

•  National Centre of Geo-informatics (NCoG) project, is a GIS platform developed for sharing, collaboration, location based analytics and decision support system for Departments. So far, 659 applications across various domains are operational.

National Knowledge Network

• A high speed data communication network has been established to interconnect Institution of higher learning, and research. So far, 1752 links to Institutions have been commissioned and made operational. 522 NKN links have been connected to NIC district centers across India.

Pradhan Mantri Gramin Digital Saksharta Abhiyaan (PMGDISHA)

• The Government has approved a new scheme titled “Pradhan Mantri Gramin Digital Saksharta Abhiyan (PMGDISHA)” to usher in digital literacy in rural India by covering 6 Crore rural households (one person per household). It has 6.63 crore registered candidates and out of this, 5.69 crore candidates have been trained and 4.22 crore have been certified.

Unified Payment Interface (UPI)

• Unified Payment Interface (UPI) is the leading digital payment platform. It has onboarded 376 banks and has facilitated 730 crore transactions (by volume) worth Rs 11.9 lakh crore.

FutureSkills Prime with NASSCOM

• MeitY in collaboration with NASSCOM has initiated a programme titled FutureSkills PRIME. The programme is aimed at re-skilling/ up-skilling of IT professionals in 10 new/emerging technologies which include Augmented/Virtual Reality, Internet of Things, Big Data Analytics, Artificial Intelligence, Robotic Process Automation, Additive Manufacturing/ 3D Printing, Cloud Computing, Social & Mobile, Cyber Security and Blockchain.

Cyber Security

• The Government has taken necessary measures to tackle challenges with regard to data privacy and data security through administering the Information Technology (IT) Act, 2000 which has necessary provisions for data privacy and data security. India has made it to the top 10 in Global Cyber security Index (GCI) 2020 launched by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) on June 29, 2021, moving up 37 places to rank as the tenth best country in the world on key cyber safety parameters.

Electronics Manufacturing

• Modified Special Incentive Package (M-SIPS): As on date, 315 applications with proposed investment of approximately Rs. 85,632 crore have been approved.
• Electronic Manufacturing Clusters (EMC): Under EMC scheme, 19 Greenfield EMCs and3 Common Facility Centres (CFCs) measuring an area of 3,464 acres with project cost ofRs. 3,732 crore including Government Grant-in-aid of Rs. 1,529 crore have been approved in 15 states across the country. Based on closure of receipt of applications under EMC scheme, MeitY notified Modified Electronics Manufacturing Clusters (EMC 2.0) Scheme on 1^st April, 2020 for further strengthening the infrastructure base for electronics industry in the country and deepening the electronics value chain. 

Digital Transformation Unleashed

The Digital India scheme, initiated in 2015, envisioned India's digital evolution into an empowered society and knowledge-based economy. The recent expansion, marked by initiatives spanning upskilling, cybersecurity, language inclusivity, and technological advancement, underscores India's commitment to technological prowess. The insights from the entrepreneurs underscore the scheme's real-world impact, catalyzing innovation, fostering inclusion, and propelling economic growth.

With the Digital India scheme gaining renewed momentum through its expansion, the nation's digital narrative is poised for a paradigm shift. The confluence of visionary government initiatives, dedicated budget allocation, and the endorsements of industry experts positions the scheme as a driving force behind India's digital transformation journey. As the scheme's impact reverberates across sectors and geographical boundaries, it lays the groundwork for an inclusive, digitally empowered India.