How India has built a unique digital infrastructure

We would like India to be less of just being a fuel for global tech companies, but to also lead the global tech movement, argued Rajeev Chandrasekhar, the Union Minister of State for Entrepreneurship, Skill Development, Electronics and Technology. The quest for leadership is only natural. There is an India model in digital infrastructure that is waiting to be evangelized across its borders. Indian digital public goods, such as the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) that powers digital transactions, are engineered to be shared across borders. Nepal and Bhutan have adopted UPI. Service providers in France are in the process of doing it. India has a suite of homemade and highly scalable digital public goods. Moreover, technological partnerships are increasingly at the center of India’s diplomatic choices. Whether it is the Quad or the US-led Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, the emphasis on technological cooperation, data sharing, and interoperability in digital services more broadly lie at the heart of these new mini-lateral arrangements. Yet, to effectively lead “the global tech movement”, India urgently needs to invest in an office of what might be called a National Technology Coordinator (NTC). There are at least four reasons to do so. First, no ministry or government department is structured to take the lead or invest a hundred percent of its capabilities to track, coordinate, and most importantly, focus its efforts on strategically leveraging all that is happening within India and globally. In addition, it is impossible for already stretched ministries to appreciate the frenzy of activity across India. From the creation of innovative digital products in Bengaluru to the multifaceted debates on the deregulation of space, and from the formation of a new ‘health stack’ to India’s advantages in biotechnologies — there is simply too much happening at any given time. Second, an NTC should ideally be located in the National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS). Not the least because there are security implications of any given aspect of emerging technologies. As importantly, the NSCS is perhaps best placed to conflict domestic rule-making and regulations with India’s position in the mini-lateral structures that promise to define the future of security and cooperation in the Indo-Pacific, for example. The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) is, of course, at the forefront of global negotiations. It has invested knowledge and created new structures for international technology negotiations. Several territorial divisions in the MEA have built their own capabilities in technology policy. The new Under Secretary in the Indian Foreign Service is already a strategic asset, well versed in deep tech. In short, they get it. The combination of tech savviest in this rank combined with the experience and wisdom of those in more senior positions adds unbelievable force to shape the cutting-edge debates of our times. What India lacks is an administrative link-chain between what the MEA does for India across its borders and the rule-making on technology within India. Take, for instance, the case of data. One of the four pillars of the — ‘connected economy’ — focuses on trade. Specifically, it aims to “pursue high-standard rules of the road in the digital economy, including standards on cross-border data flows and data localization.” India, rightly so, has a view on data and data localization. There is a clear need for a national personal data law, which can provide the domestic framework to shape an Indian position more clearly on the future of global data governance and cross-border data flows. This will, without doubt, become more urgent when India takes over the presidency of the G20 on 1 December 2022.