Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs announces 'Open Data Week'

The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) on Monday announced the initiation of the Open Data Week to encourage the adoption of open data and promote innovation across India's urban ecosystem.

According to the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, leading up to the 'Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav - Smart Cities: Smart Urbanization' conference scheduled to be held in Surat, during February 2022, the Open Data Week is part of a series of pre-event initiatives being undertaken by MoHUA to promote awareness and use of open data.

It will be conducted during the third week of January, i.e., from 17th January 2022 to 21st January 2022, said the ministry.

As per the ministry, the event will see participation from all 100 Smart Cities that will be publishing high-quality datasets and data blogs on the Smart Cities Open Data Portal. Presently, more than 3,800 datasets and more than 60 data stories are already available on the Portal to various stakeholders to analyse this data and uncover actionable insights.

The event aims to show the benefits of open data such as increased efficiency, transparency, a spur in innovation, and economic growth. It is divided into two segments - first, uploading of datasets, visualizations, APIs and data blogs on the Smart Cities Open Data Portal from 17th January 2022 to 20th January 2022 and second, the celebration of a Data Day by all smart cities on 21st January 2022, stated the ministry.

It further said that the Data Day will take place nationally across all smart cities and will include talks, seminars, hackathons, demonstrations, and training on different data tracks identified by the cities. The Day will see the engagement of people from different backgrounds including government agencies, private sector enterprises, scientific and academic institutions, businesses, start-ups, civil society etc.

The idea is to provide a platform that offers ample opportunities on how to continue creating and promoting the use of data that addresses complex urban issues, such as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, said the ministry.

It further stated that the event has been designed to promote the use of and spread awareness about data. There are also many different groups of people and organisations that can benefit from the availability of quality data. New combinations of data can create new knowledge and insights, which can lead to whole new fields of application. This can help governments in solving some of the most common problems faced by the citizens of any city and replicating the successful ideas in other cities.

All 100 smart cities are geared up for the event, making it a collaborative effort towards making Indian cities 'Data Smart', it added.