Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced an outlay of Rs 4,795.24 crore for the Digital India Programme as part of the Budget 2023-24.
This is a decline of 37 percent from last year’s outlay of Rs 7,603.5 crore.
Numbers compared to previous years
The Centre had initially allocated Rs 10,676.18 crore to the initiative.
Last year, MeitY had received around Rs 10,676,18 crore for Digital India in the Budget, a 67.13 percent jump from Rs 6,388 crores the previous financial year.
This was eventually revised to Rs 6703.5 crore which is especially significant considering the total budget allocation for MeitY stood at Rs 14,300 crore for 2022-23 as against Rs 9,581.25 crore in 2021-22.
What is Digital India?
Digital India is a flagship programme of the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY).
The vision is to transform the country into a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy.
The programme is centred on “three key vision areas”.
Digital Infrastructure as a core utility to every citizen
- Availability of high speed internet as a core utility for delivery of services to citizens
- Cradle to grave digital identity that is unique, lifelong, online and authenticable to every citizen
- Mobile phone & bank account enabling citizen participation in digital and financial space
- Easy access to a Common Service Centre
- Shareable private space on a public cloud
- Safe and secure cyber-space
Governance & Services on Demand
- Seamlessly integrated services across departments or jurisdictions
- Availability of services in real time from online & mobile platforms
- All citizen entitlements to be portable and available on the cloud
- Digitally transformed services for improving ease of doing business
- Making financial transactions electronic & cashless
- Leveraging Geospatial Information Systems (GIS) for decision support systems & development.
Digital Empowerment of Citizens
- Universal digital literacy
- Universally accessible digital resources
- Availability of digital resources / services in Indian languages
- Collaborative digital platforms for participative governance
- Citizens not required to physically submit Govt. documents / certificates
