ONDC, account aggregator, logistic change will lead to important economic activities: Nandan Nilekani

New Delhi. Nandan Nilekani, co-founder and chairman of information technology company Infosys Technologies, said on Tuesday that India will see “significant economic activity” in the next decade due to steps like Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC).

Addressing the seventh ‘Global Technology Summit’ organized here by Carnegie India, Nilekani said that the next decade will see broad-based, inclusive and democratic economic activities in India. He said that this would happen because of three changes taking place at the present time.

Elaborating, Nilekani said, “There are three big things happening right now that will impact India over the next decade. First is ONDC, second is account aggregator network and third is the changes coming due to GST, FASTag and e-way bill in the logistics sector. The ONDC being formally constituted will start soon.

Through ONDC, lakhs of small suppliers will be able to sell their products on this electronic network. Apart from this, small vendors will be helped to make their business inclusive. Along with this, the Infosys chairman said that the concept of account aggregator network is also going to bring a fundamental change. The idea behind this is to allow only the people who created the data to use it.

This way individuals and small businesses can use the data to access a range of services. “A consent manager in an account aggregator network receives data about you from various service providers on your behalf and then disseminates the same to others for varying benefits. With this, the process of disbursing loans and other financial services is going to be fundamentally more democratic.

Nilekani said that the changes taking place in the logistics sector will also have a wider impact in the coming decade. He said that steps like GST, Fastag and e-way bill are changing the logistics sector and now the movement of vehicles and goods on the highways has become easier.

Along with this, while mentioning that the number of citizens holding Aadhaar card has increased to 130 crore, he said that this online identification system can be used anywhere in the country. The issuance of Aadhaar identification numbers began when Nilekani was the head of the project.