UNICEF’s ‘Global Outlook 2025: Prospects for Children’ deals with the transformative role that DPI can play in delivery of digital public services for children.

What is meant by DPI?

• It is a set of shared digital systems that deliver and provide equitable access to public and/or private services at societal scale.
• Its ecosystem comprises technology, markets and governance.

Role of DPI in children's well-being

• Equitable access to essential services: E.g. Digital IDs connected to civil registration systems enable lifelong access to essential services.
  • Education: E.g. India’s national digital education platform, DIKSHA, bridges educational gaps.
  • Health: Facilitates electronic health records. E.g. Electronic Immunization Registry in Jamaica improved childhood vaccination rate.
• Foster financial literacy and inclusion by enabling children to participate in the digital economy
• Enhances social protection systems by enabling targeted delivery of benefits and improved data sharing for better child services.

Challenges associated with use of DPI

• Poor connectivity and digital inequality: E.g.- Only 43.6% of Indian rural youth aged 15-24 can send emails.
• Poor integration of Civil Registration and Vital Statistics (CRVS) systems into national ID: It restricts universal coverage.
• Others: Lack of data interoperability and harmonization across systems, data protection, security and surveillance issues, etc.

Ministry of Education releases Unified District Information System for Education Plus (UDISE+) 2023-24 Report on School Education. 

• In UDISE+ 2023-24 for the first time, at national level individual student wise data has been collected from all recognized schools in country through UDISE+ since 2022-23. 
• It is aligned with recommendations of NEP 2020. 

Key findings of UDISE+ 2023-24

• Student Enrolments: Overall dip in school enrolments as well across country, falling from 25.18 crore in 2022-23 to 24.8 crore in 2023-24.
  • This represents a drop of about 1.55 crore students (nearly 6%) from 2018-19 to 2021-22.
• Dropouts: Zero-dropout rate at Foundational level (pre-primary to Class 2) is due to admission of students from Anganwadi, standalone private pre-primary school directly to Class I in recognized schools.
  • Maximum dropout rates were at Secondary level (Classes 9 to 12).
  • Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra saw among highest drop in enrolments. 
• Retention rate: Higher at elementary level.
• Gross Enrollment Ratio (GER): Minor dip at all levels except at the secondary level.
  • GER compares enrolment in a specific level of education to population of age group that is age-appropriate for that level of education.
• School infrastructure: Assam, Odisha, and Karnataka face underutilised infrastructure due to low student-to-school ratios

The Women Entrepreneurship Platform (WEP) of NITI Aayog has launched EmpowHER Biz – Sapno Ki Udaan.

• WEP, incubated in NITI Aayog in 2018 as an aggregator platform, have transitioned into a public-private partnership in 2022 EmpowHER Biz.
• Objectives
  • Empower women entrepreneurs by equipping them with the skills and resources needed.
  • It will offer mentorship covering retail management, digital tools, financial literacy and business development to aspiring women entrepreneurs.