Three years of formation: Niti Aayog working to adopt AI, blockchain in governance

Having completed three years since its formation, the Niti Aayog is now working towards adoption of frontier technologies such artificial intelligence and blockchain in the areas of governance. The government think-tank believes that such technologies will result in significant benefits if deployed in the areas of education and health, among others. In a note highlighting its achievements in the last three years, Niti Aayog said it "is working on a strategy paper for blockchain in India which will outline use cases as well as map out the schemes of Government of India that stand to benefit from the utilisation of the technology." Blockchain technology allows digital information to be distributed but not copied. "It is like a distributed ledger. Suppose, you have made 50000 photocopies of a book and you make some change in the original book, then the blockchain technique allows you to replicate the change in all the copies by changing just the original book. We are still exploring and believe this technology can have potentially beneficial uses in the areas of education, health, social sector etc," a senior official at the Aayog said, asking not to be named.