Why national data will remain contested

The expansion and transformation of the Indian economy has altered the scale of measurement and the way data is gathered

Afew years ago, then chairman of the National Statistical Commission (NSC) Pronab Sen released the results of the sixth national Economic Census to a minuscule crowd of reporters in central Delhi. Last week, when the vice chairman of Niti Aayog Rajiv Kumar called a press conference to contest an employment report prepared by the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO), it was a media event that was posted on YouTube. 

The firestorm over the latter report, suppressed by the government but reported by Business Standard, continues. National statistics are now contested territory and the battle over them will intensify in the