Source: PRS India
Recently the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology released a consultation whitepaper on “Strategy for National Open Digital Ecosystems (NODE)”.
The key components of National Open Digital Ecosystems:
- Public digital infrastructure comprising digital platforms from the government such as Aadhaar and GST network
- Laws to govern the infrastructure with regard to data privacy, security, and domain-specific policies and standards, and
- Community leveraging this infrastructure to create value for all.
What is the NODE?
- It refers to a national strategy for enabling digital governance.
- An example of NODE is the eTransport Mission Mode Project under the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways.
- It comprises two applications- Vahan and Sarathi which automate the vehicle registration and driver licensing operations respectively. The availability of this digitized data enables this platform to provide services to various entities including citizens, automobile dealers, insurance companies, and police.
- Further, the platform ensures data integration with other systems such as stolen vehicle data from the National Crime Record Bureau and insurance data from Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority.
- It also provides interoperability with external applications such as payment gateways and DigiLocker.
About Consultation paper its key guiding principles for a NODE
- Openness and interoperability
- Reusability and shareability
- Ensuring security and privacy
- Defining accountable institutions, and
- Enabling effective grievance redressal.
