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DPI Brief — July 28, 2026 Nilekani-Led Task Force to Build Leak-Proof Exam System (L1 + L6) Prime Minister Modi constituted a six-member high-powered task force on July 26, chaired by Aadhaar architect and former UIDAI chairman Nandan Nilekani, to recommend technology-driven reforms for India’s public examination system. The panel includes former ISRO chairman S. Somanath, ex-Intelligence Bureau director Arvind Deka, former IIT Madras director V. Kamakoti, former Union Education Secretary Anita Karwal, and senior bureaucrat Amrit Lal Meena. ...

DPI Deep Dive — Monday | July 27, 2026 L1 Identity & Authentication: Aadhaar’s Security Reboot, Exam System Failures, and the Institutional Trust Deficit This week’s L1 layer — Identity & Authentication — was dominated by two converging storylines: UIDAI’s efforts to harden Aadhaar’s verification ecosystem, and a cascading institutional security crisis in India’s examination infrastructure that has shaken public trust in digital governance systems. 1. UIDAI Pivots to Offline-First Verification, Partners with NFSU on Cyber Forensics UIDAI this week updated its Aadhaar Paperless Offline e-KYC framework, reinforcing a strategic pivot away from real-time CIDR (Central Identities Data Repository) authentication for routine use cases. The updated guidelines, last reviewed on July 22, 2026, formalise the Verifiable Credential (VC) verification model introduced under the Aadhaar (Authentication and Offline Verification) Amendment Regulations, 2025. 1 ...

DPI Brief — July 27, 2026 Nilekani Task Force: Aadhaar Architect Returns to Fix India’s Exam System Layer: L6 (Governance) + L1 (Identity) Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a high-powered task force on examination reforms, appointing Nandan Nilekani — the founding chairman of UIDAI and architect of Aadhaar — as its head. The move comes after days of nationwide “Cockroach Janata Party” protests over the NEET 2026 paper leak, which forced the cancellation of the medical entrance exam for 2 million students and was linked to over a dozen student suicides. ...

DPI Brief — July 26, 2026 Digital Agriculture Mission Reaches 5.28 Crore Farmers Layer: L5 — Sectoral (AgriStack) Union Minister Ramnath Thakur informed the Rajya Sabha that the Digital Agriculture Mission has now reached 5.28 crore farmers across India. The initiative deploys AI, machine learning, blockchain, IoT, and robotics to modernise Indian agriculture. Key components include the National Pest Surveillance System for AI-powered crop protection, IMD weather advisories integrated into farm decision-making, and the BharatVistaar platform for geospatial agricultural data. States and Union Territories are being supported in implementing these technologies under the centrally sponsored scheme. This scale of farmer coverage represents a significant milestone in India’s push to build AgriStack — the digital agriculture infrastructure layer that aims to create farmer registries, crop sowing data, and a unified platform for agricultural services. ...

DPI Deep Dive — Friday | July 25, 2026 This week’s Layer 5 deep dive covers India’s sectoral digital public infrastructure — health (ABHA/ABDM), agriculture (PM-KUSUM, AgriStack adjacents), and judiciary (eCourts). The past seven days have been remarkably active across all three verticals. 1. ABHA Crosses 940 Million IDs: India’s Digital Health Backbone at BRICS At the 16th BRICS Health Ministers’ Meeting in Chandigarh (July 21–24), Union Health Secretary Smt. Punya Salila Srivastava presented India’s digital health infrastructure to an international audience. The numbers are staggering: over 940 million ABHA (Ayushman Bharat Health Account) IDs have been created, and more than 1 billion (100 crore) health records are now digitally linked through the system. Over 1 million healthcare professionals have been issued unique digital identities, and 5.33 lakh health facilities are registered on the platform. 1 ...

DPI Deep Dive — Friday | July 24, 2026 Layer L5: Sectoral Infrastructure — ABHA & Digital Health, AgriStack, eCourts This week’s sectoral DPI layer saw significant movement across health, agriculture, and judiciary. India is hosting the BRICS Health Ministerial with digital health as a centrepiece, NHA conducted a major national review of ABDM, AgriStack-ULI convergence with land records accelerated, and the Supreme Court’s draft AI regulations for courts approached finalisation. Here’s the deep dive. ...

DPI Brief — July 24, 2026 ONDC Hits Record 12 Million Monthly Orders in July The Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) has scaled to a fresh all-time high of 12 million orders in July, with daily orders peaking at approximately 430,000. Of these, 4.4 million orders came from the mobility domain, while the remaining 7.6 million were from non-mobility segments — food and beverages (1.7 million), grocery (1.4 million), and fashion (0.6 million), with the balance spread across on-network logistics, beauty and personal care, home and kitchen, and retail vouchers. The network now encompasses roughly 630,000 sellers and service providers across 600 cities, delivering to 1,200 cities nationwide. Separately, ONDC appointed Rohit Lohia as Chief Business Officer, bringing fintech and e-commerce experience to strengthen the open commerce ecosystem. ...

DPI Brief — July 23, 2026 L2: UPI Crosses 55.5 Crore Users, ₹314 Lakh Crore in FY26 Transactions The government informed the Lok Sabha that UPI user base reached 55.49 crore as of June 2026, with FY26 processing 24,161.69 crore transactions worth ₹314.23 lakh crore — up 30% in volume and 20.6% in value over FY25 (₹260.56 lakh crore). Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary outlined security measures including risk-based transaction limits by RBI and NPCI. The data was shared in response to a parliamentary question covering state-wise user adoption and fraud mitigation steps. ...

DPI Deep Dive — Wednesday | July 22, 2026 This week’s L3 Deep Dive covers Documents & Data Exchange — the layer that turns India’s digital identity and payment rails into something you can actually use: verified credentials, paperless academic records, and machine-readable data flows between government systems. DigiLocker, NAD, APAAR, e-Sanad, and API Setu form the connective tissue of India Stack, and the past seven days have seen significant activity across these platforms. ...

DPI Brief — July 22, 2026 Supreme Court Directs CBSE to Implement APAAR Opt-Out Nationwide The Supreme Court on July 20 said it will direct the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) to implement the Orissa High Court’s December 2025 judgment requiring the APAAR (Automated Permanent Academic Account Registry) consent form to explicitly offer parents the option to refuse Aadhaar-linking and opt out of the scheme. The Court noted that the Centre did not challenge the Orissa HC order, effectively accepting it. Petitioners had argued that the APAAR scheme effectively compels Aadhaar enrollment for students, raising serious privacy and data protection concerns. While the Court stopped short of striking down the scheme, it directed CBSE to “examine the issues” around parental consent and data safeguards. APAAR — a DPI layer-adjacent identity initiative that creates a permanent academic account linked to Aadhaar — now faces sharpened scrutiny as India’s DPDP Act gradually takes effect. The case is a bellwether for how consent and data minimisation obligations will be enforced on Aadhaar-linked government schemes. (MediaNama, Times of India) ...