New Delhi: With 39 central ministries and state governments using and benefiting from the PM GatiShakti National Master Plan, the Centre is considering giving the private sector limited access to the platform, ThePrint has learnt.
At present, the PM GatiShakti portal — a digital platform mapping details of all infrastructure and logistic facilities in the country on a geographic information system (GIS) map — is being used by government departments and agencies only.
“Any relevant data layers that need to be shared with the private sector are being done on specific request of the ministry concerned by creating a separate portal through our technical partners, BISAG-N (Bhaskaracharya Institute for Space Applications and Geoinformatics). We are also working with the private sector on integrating possible elements of Artificial Intelligence for a demand driven approach,” a senior official of Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) told ThePrint.
The DPIIT, which comes under the Union commerce ministry, manages and hosts the GatiShakti National Master Plan (NMP) platform.
With details of all physical and social infrastructure facilities, including data of the forest/habitation/other assets they are passing through, mapped on the platform, the portal gives a bird’s eye view of India’s infrastructure and logistics facilities/assets on a GIS map.
At the click of a mouse, central ministries and states can visualise their proposed projects vis-à-vis other assets passing through the same route and also check against any obstacles coming in the way at the planning stage itself.
So far, 39 central ministries and all states and union territories are present at the Gati Shakti NMP and mapped their relevant data on the GIS map. With both the central ministries and states benefitting from it, a need was felt to open the platform — with limited access — to the private sector, which is also involved in developing infrastructure projects either on their own or in partnership with the government.
“The GatiShakti platform hosts some sensitive data involving critical infrastructure, which can’t be shared with the private sector. Also, the data ownership is with the line ministries. Before opening the portal to the private sector, we have to put in place adequate safeguards to protect sensitive data,” a second government official said.
The official further said that intensive inter-ministerial consultations are already being held with the ministries to decide on the extent of the data that can be shared. “Several sensitive aspects will need to be kept in mind, within the overall framework of the country’s policies before a final decision is taken.”
To look into data management and cybersecurity aspects of PM GatiShakti National Plan, the Centre had set up an interministerial task force comprising senior officials from DPIIT, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeITY) and other stakeholder ministries last December.
“The taskforce has held a series of meetings. The process has been vetted and reviewed and SOPs developed by experts for ensuring rigorous cyber security, involving Meity, CERT-in, BISAG-N, National Informatics Centre and led by Logistics Division of the commerce and industry ministry,” the second official said.
The DPIIT official quoted earlier added, “Till a final framework for allowing private sector access is readied, it is very encouraging to see continuous improvements in data quality and usage for Ease of Doing Business and Ease of Living. And that is our foremost priority for the present.”
When the GatiShakti National Master Plan was launched in October 2021, the infrastructure ministries were the first to be onboarded. For instance, the rail ministry has mapped its entire rail line network, status of projects including widening, electrification, gauge conversion, development of cargo terminals, among others, into the NMP.
The highways ministry has mapped the entire database of the national highways, the Bharat Mala greenfield corridors, the proposed multimodal logistics hub, besides the network of state highways, district roads, etc. on the platform. The telecom ministry has also mapped all its infra including the network of towers and optical fibres.
The economic and social sector ministries were the next to come on board and have mapped their data. For instance, the education ministry has mapped the data of all primary-level schools on the portal. Now, looking at the platform, one can check areas that are underserved, possible constraints in connectivity to schools, etc and accordingly plans can be made to address the bottlenecks.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
Also Read: Spots for new schools to area development for tourism — how states are using Gati Shakti master plan