As India marches towards its goal of becoming a $5 trillion economy and a developed nation by 2047, the need for high-quality, granular, and timely data has never been more urgent. While we celebrate national-level economic estimates and flagship data releases, the real test of effective governance and policymaking lies at the district level — where lives are lived, resources are allocated, and development challenges are most immediate. Yet, the statistical infrastructure at this level remains worryingly inadequate.
India’s 780 districts are not just administrative units; they are dynamic economic entities with distinct sectoral profiles, labour markets, and development challenges. Accurate, district-level economic and social data — such as business activity indicators, industrial production, employment trends, and social development metrics — can provide a crucial bottom-up perspective for more tailored and effective policymaking.
Existing scene
Unfortunately, the capacity to generate such data at the district level is not robust. The Directorates of Economics and Statistics (DES) in most States— tasked with compiling and disseminating district-level statistics — operate with outdated systems, limited funding, and under-skilled personnel. Existing staff often come from generalist administrative services, lacking training in advanced statistics, economics, or data science. As a result, critical data gathering becomes either patchy or unreliable, undermining evidence-based governance.
Compounding the problem is chronic understaffing. Many positions at DES remain perpetually vacant, and the burden on existing staff is overwhelming. With skeleton teams juggling multiple tasks, there is an inevitable trade-off: speed over quality, compliance over innovation. Data collection often becomes a mechanical exercise rather than a scientific one
In today’s data-driven world, the quality of a nation’s policymaking is only as good as the data it is built on. Yet, for a country as large and diverse as India, there remains a troubling gap at the very foundation of its statistical system — the districts. If India seeks to formulate effective, targeted, and future-ready policies, robust and clean district-level economic, development, and social data is no longer a luxury — it is an absolute necessity. The current reality, however, is far from this ideal.
The principle is straightforward: better district-level data means better State-level and national estimates. High-quality, timely, and granular statistics allow policymakers to identify local challenges early, allocate resources efficiently, and design interventions that are tailored to actual needs rather than broad assumptions. Without a strong “bottom-up” statistical infrastructure, even the most well-intentioned policies risk missing their mark.
India’s average district size — approximately 2-2.5 million people — is comparable to that of many small countries such as Latvia, Bahrain, Mauritius, and Cyprus to name a few . However, institutions like the District Industrial Committees and District Planning Departments have largely remained dormant and fallow, primarily due to the lack of reliable data. This has limited the ability to assign meaningful KPIs to district administrations. In contrast, the Aspirational Districts programme, where data is systematically generated and monitored, has demonstrated that regular data use can enhance governance, economic performance, and human development outcomes.
India urgently needs to revamp its district-level statistical apparatus. The solution lies in attracting and embedding young, technically skilled talent into the system. Graduates from premier institutions — the Indian Statistical Institutes (ISIs), IITs, top statistics, economics and data science programmes — should be incentivised to work with the DES at least for a fixed tenure. These technocrats, economists, and data scientists would bring fresh thinking, digital skills, and a quality-first ethos that is currently missing. Further, each State may consider forming intensive collaborations with ICSSR-sponsored institutions or other equivalent research bodies within the State, as these institutions typically maintain a higher level of academic rigour.
Imagine a DES office in a district not running on hand-filled registers and Excel sheets, but on real-time data dashboards, AI-assisted surveys, geospatial mapping, and predictive analytics. Imagine district GDP estimates, poverty mapping, skill gap analysis, agricultural productivity assessments, and MSME activity tracking — all being generated with scientific rigour and published transparently.
States showing the way
Some States offer useful lessons. Maharashtra’s DES regularly produces district-level data handbooks, has undertaken employment-unemployment surveys, and publishes gender-disaggregated and sector-specific statistics to inform State policy. The aforesaid State has the help of and collaborated with Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics for leveraging the technical services. Kerala’s DES supports decentralised planning with detailed panchayat-level datasets, and Tamil Nadu has used data-driven methods to allocate resources through the State Balanced Growth Fund (SBGF), showing how sub-State data can directly drive policy innovation.
The way forward
As India’s digital economy grows and governance becomes increasingly data-reliant, sub-national statistical capacity can no longer be an afterthought. A reformed and empowered DES — staffed by skilled professionals, supported by cutting-edge technology, and linked with research institutions — can become the foundation of India’s next-generation governance.
Data is power — but only when it’s available, reliable, and locally relevant. To build a Viksit Bharat, we must first build a data-smart district development blueprint based on real-time data
If we continue to base national strategies on shaky, aggregated, and outdated district data, we risk flying blind into the future. A bottom-up statistical revolution — led by skilled minds, powered by modern technology, and committed to accuracy — can change that. The future of India’s policymaking will depend not just on big ideas at the Centre, but on the invisible, painstaking work of high quality and timely data generation in its 780 districts. It’s time we recognised that and acted accordingly.
Kumar is Chairman, and Jha is a Fellow, at Pahle India Foundation, a Delhi-based policy think tank