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Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI)
Context:
Digital public infrastructure (DPI) has emerged as a transformative force, enhancing governance, driving sustainable development, empowering nations, and improving lives globally.
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- Championed by India, DPI’s impact is far-reaching, benefiting over 1.5 billion people worldwide.
- From G20 summits to Quad discussions and bilateral dialogues, DPI has gained recognition as a key driver of equity and progress.
- Its unprecedented success spans various sectors, including digital identity, payments, credit access, healthcare, agriculture, mobility, and tax collection, galvanising both authorities and civil society.
Need for Sutras
- Goal of DPI: The primary goal of any DPI is to serve the public good.
- Guiding Principles: Rather than focusing on rigid definitions, it is crucial to establish guiding principles that can effectively assess DPIs.
- These principles, or “sutras” (literally meaning threads or aphoristic statements that define broader ideas), form India’s significant contribution to the global DPI discourse.
- Citizen Stack: Encapsulated in the Citizen Stack—an ecosystem endorsed by the Indian government—these sutras ensure that digital infrastructure aligns with the public good.
- By offering a structured framework, Citizen Stack facilitates the validation and assessment of DPIs, setting a global benchmark.
Defining Sutras
- Guide: As global discussions on DPI intensify, sutras serve as a definitive guide to developing public digital infrastructure.
- These principles emphasise citizen agency and privacy, interoperability, techno-legal regulation, prevention of corporatisation and monopolisation, and safeguards against weaponisation.
- Actionable Frameworks: These are not just ideals but actionable frameworks ensuring that DPIs empower citizens, bridge digital divides, protect sovereignty, and navigate complexities through a model centred on public ownership and provisioning.
- The sutras create a blueprint for a future where digital infrastructure promotes inclusivity and fairness.
Importance of Vetting DPI
- Consider a platform like Microsoft Windows. While it is a widely available digital infrastructure, it operates as a paid service.
- The questions of ownership and service provisioning directly impact the public good.
- While international collaboration is necessary, nations must balance self-reliance with cooperative efforts.
- DPIs, through institutions and standards championed by Citizen Stack, provide the means to achieve this equilibrium.
Addressing Market Monopolies
- The financial sector provides a compelling case for the need for fair competition and equitable access.
- Testimonies from Visa and Mastercard executives before the US Senate highlighted their market dominance, with profit margins exceeding 50%.
- They offered preferential rates to large merchants like Walmart while disadvantaging smaller businesses.
- In such an oligopolistic landscape, small enterprises have limited alternatives, underscoring the need for DPIs that ensure fair access.
Introducing Citizen Stack
- Credible Alternative: For instance, India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) has revolutionised digital payments, processing over 15 billion transactions worth billions of rupees monthly.
- Operated by the non-profit National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) and backed by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and various banks, UPI ensures low-cost, efficient, and secure transactions.
- Another DPI, the Open Credit Enablement Network (OCEN), facilitates credit access by enabling users to share financial data securely with lenders.
- With 154 million consents processed across 128 million accounts, OCEN demonstrates the effectiveness of a DPI-driven financial ecosystem.
- Private Sector Participation: Additionally, private sector participants such as PhonePe and Google Pay leverage UPI to provide seamless financial solutions while adhering to DPI principles.
- These collaborations between public institutions and private enterprises illustrate the potential of DPI to spur innovation and drive economic inclusion.
DPI is not merely a solution for underserved populations—it is a transformative model for economic systems that promote fairness, self-reliance, and equal opportunities. India’s comprehensive approach, guided by Citizen Stack’s sutras across policy, legal, institutional, governance, and funding frameworks, ensures the integrity of DPI initiatives.
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The Source’s Authority and Ownership of the Article is Claimed By THE STUDY IAS BY MANIKANT SINGH
