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A workshop on “Accelerating Innovation through Data Sharing” was organised by the Data Exchange Informatics Division of the National Informatics Centre (NIC), Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) on 26th March 2025 at Hotel Vivanta, Guwahati, Assam. The workshop was attended by government officials, academia and participants from all the northeastern states.

The workshop facilitated a high-level dialogue on the best practices and future strategies for unlocking the value of data resources as a catalyst for transparency, efficiency, and innovation across the Government, the digital economy, and the society at large. By bringing together diverse voices from India’s data ecosystem, it aimed to enable and encourage data sharing by Government and private stakeholders to accelerate digital innovation and transformation, with a particular focus on the challenges and opportunities in the North Eastern Region.

The workshop commenced with the lighting of lamps, followed by a welcome address from Ms. Usha Saxena, Senior Director / Scientist-F, NIC.

Ms. Alka Misra, Deputy Director General / Scientist-G, NIC, set the context of the workshop through a presentation on “Accelerating India’s Data Ecosystem through an Unified Data Exchange.”

Shri K.S. Gopinath Narayan, IAAS, Principal Secretary (IT), Government of Assam, delivered the Keynote Address of the workshop, where he focused on the efforts of the Government of Assam to enable data-driven governance, under the mandate of the Assam State Data Policy 2022, for tackling pressing implementation challenges and achieving desired outcomes on high priority initiatives.

The inaugural address was delivered online by Shri I.P.S. Sethi, Director General, NIC.. He highlighted the key barriers that must be addressed to accelerate effective utilization of government data resources for decision-making and innovation, such as Data Silos, Interoperability, and Standardisation.

• Shri Bhaskar Jyoti Mahanta, IPS, Chief Information Commissioner of Assam & former DGP (HoPF) shared valuable thoughts on “Data Exchange for National Security and Law Exchange.”. His wide experience in law enforcement coupled with the significance of data was very informative.
• Shri Amit Sharma, IAS, IT Secretary, Government of Mizoram spoke on how data implementation should be done and how data sharing has become a major hub.
• Shri Brijendra Kumar, Partner, KPMG India, spoke on the Technology Trends in Data Exchange Services.

Vote of Thanks was delivered by Shri Chhatrasal Chandra, Scientist D, Ministry of Electronics and Information   Technology (MeitY).

The afternoon session featured the following speakers:

1. Lt. Gen. Rana Pratap Kalita, Chairperson, Assam Finance Commission, former GOC-in-C, Eastern Command, Indian Army, Government of Assam
2. Shri Shubham Arora, Partner, KPMG India
3. Shri Gaurav Godhwani, Co-founder and Executive Director, CivicDataLab
4. Shri Dr. Hiten Choudhary, HoD, Department of CS and IT, Cotton University
5. Prof. Shikhar Kumar Sarma, Dean, Faculty of Technology, Gauhati University
6. Shri Th. Kirankumar, IAS, IT Secretary, Government of Manipur

The workshop concluded with an open house discussion session, followed by sharing of closing remarks. We are grateful to the distinguished speakers, panelists & participants for making the event productive and successful.

The workshop received an overwhelming response from the northeastern states. Participants emphasized that this was the first event of its kind in the region and highlighted its significance in fostering collaboration and innovation. It was strongly recommended that similar workshops be organized in the other northeastern states in the near future to further drive data-driven progress and regional development.