New Delhi: The government on Monday said that work of the task force led to acceptance of definition and framework of the digital public infrastructure or DPI during India’s G20 Presidency, and is expected to be taken forward during the Brazilian and South African G20 Presidencies. The report on the G20 task force will play a key role in defining the future course of DPI approach and actions around the globe.
Releasing the report, the finance ministry in its statement said that after a very successful G20 Presidency and upon the culmination of its tenure, the report of the task force is aimed at strengthening the foundations of DPI worldwide. “The report highlights the need to identify an existing body of global standard with the scope of multinational presence, to foster and harness DPI ecosystem across various regions and countries especially global south countries,” the ministry said.
“Many countries across the world are considering how to develop their national digital infrastructure to accelerate economic progress through drastic improvement in provisioning public services, and foster trust between people and the institutions by improving transparency and reducing distance. The report will play a key role in defining the future course of DPI approach and actions for implementation around the globe, particularly in the Global South,” it added.
Commenting on the report, Amitabh Kant, G20 Sherpa of India, said that India did an incredible pole vault in DPI. "We achieved in 9 years what would have taken 50 years without DPI. Today in India, UPI is used at all levels from street vendors to large shopping malls, with the highest percentage of digital transactions globally, accounting for nearly 46 per cent share. All these proved to be building blocks for India to steer through the Covid-19 pandemic, be it transfer $4.5 billion into the bank accounts of 160 million beneficiaries or facilitate distribution of 2.5 million vaccinations in two years with digital vaccine certificates on mobiles,” he said.
However, co-chair of Task Force, Nandan Nilekani, said that the governments and businesses around the world are increasingly realising that if they really want to achieve sustainable development goals or SDGs and social goals like inclusive growth, it has to have underlying DPI to make that happen. “DPI has the power to dramatically improve the lives of citizens and transform governance. It has happened here in India and it started with the Aadhaar ID system, aimed at providing a digital identity to every Indian,” Nilekani said.
“Now, around 1.3 billion Indians possess this digital ID and on average 10 million eKYC per day is being facilitated through Aadhar. Meanwhile in payment, UPI facilitates 13 billion transactions monthly, serving about 350 million individuals and 50 million merchants and DPI enabled direct transfer has saved the government $41 billion across central government schemes,” he added.
