- Why in news
- On 25 May 2026, DARPG launched the NeSDA 2025 portal at a meeting with nodal officers of Central Ministries and States/UTs. The portal will collect data online for the 2025 assessment cycle (release dated 28 May 2026).
- What it is
- NeSDA is a biennial framework developed by DARPG to measure how deep and effective online service delivery is, from the citizen's view. It is built on the Online Service Index of the UN e-Government Survey and adapted to India's federal structure. It benchmarks States, UTs and focus Central Ministries.
- Who runs it
- NeSDA is developed by the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG), Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions.
- Basis
- It draws on the UN e-Government Survey's Online Service Index, customised for India's federal structure.
- Frequency
- The assessment is biennial, held every two years.
- Services assessed
- NeSDA 2025 proposes 59 mandatory services for each State and UT and 43 for Central Ministries/Departments.
- New addition
- Services of the Ministry of Corporate Affairs are added to the focus sectors in NeSDA 2025.
- Parameters
- Parameters include accessibility, content availability, ease of use, information security and privacy, end service delivery, integrated service delivery, status tracking, Open Government Data, e-participation and emerging technologies.
Don’t confuse with NeSDA vs UN E-Government Survey: NeSDA is India's domestic DARPG assessment of States, UTs and Ministries. The UN E-Government Survey ranks countries and is published by the UN; NeSDA borrows its Online Service Index.
Reports and indices: 14 Prelims questions since 2013; they test who publishes a report and what it measures.
Why it matters
- Benchmarking pushes States and Ministries to improve online public services and share best practices.
- Citizen-centric assessment helps identify gaps in G2C and G2B service delivery.
Problems
- Data is self-submitted by States and Ministries, so verification and consistency matter.
- Uneven digital capacity and infrastructure across States limit service maturity.
Way forward
- Act on assessment gaps through capacity building and regular reviews with nodal officers.
- Promote integrated, end-to-end online services with status tracking and wider use of open data.
- 2024Mains GS2 · Q18Evaluate the role of the Interactive Service Model in e-governance for transparency and accountability.
- 2023Mains GS2 · Q8What inadequacies hamper effectiveness, transparency and accountability in e-governance?
- 2025Mains GS2 · Q7Examine whether e-governance projects are biased toward technology over user-centric design.
UPSC’s own questions that come close to this issue, from our Prelims and Mains banks.
No practice question for this one; the card may still help an answer. Why: Lasting governance index run by DARPG, based on UN Online Service Index. Few distinctive facts; Reports are 4% of Prelims questions.
Source: PIB, Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions, 28 May, 16:32 IST · Release 289349
Worth revising until Prelims 2027: most news questions come within two years of the event.