The government of Maharashtra will in the next five to six months make a regulatory sandbox for testing blockchain-based applications it intends to develop. Notably, the Maharashtra government is the second largest state in India, is home to over 114 million people and the capital town, Mumbai.
According to the August 19 report in a local Indian daily, the Maharashtra government intends to incorporate blockchain technology in some of its services. This is because services supported by the blockchain technology cannot be hacked or tampered with especially by third parties.
The services the government of Maharashtra intends to incorporate blockchain technology on includes; supply chain services, agricultural marketing services, vehicle registration services, and document management services.
SVR Srinivas, the State Information Technology Department principal secretary while talking to the local daily on the same, said;
“The state government is adopting a cutting edge technology to help enhance efficiency in governance. Already the government has completed its first blockchain pilot in the fields of health, supply chain, documents, and SSC certificates. A detailed report has been prepared to go in for extensive use of blockchain technology in various government departments. A regulatory sandbox, which will be a common framework for adopting blockchain technology, will be prepared in the next five to six months.”
The regulatory sandbox is set to outline a common framework for adopting and regulating the blockchain-based technology the government of Maharashtra intends to incorporate in the various services.
Reportedly, Maharashtra Information Technology Directorate is set to lead the two initiatives. Srinivas is reported to have also stated that the government has already set aside 100 million rupees ($1.4 million) for the adoption of blockchain technology in the 4 selected sectors. Further, that out of the 100 million rupees, 40 million rupees ($560,000) has already been directly approved by the implementation committee.
The Indian state has set the period for the adoption of the blockchain technology into the four service sectors to run from 2019–2020.
Notably, various Indian companies and government institutions have been applying blockchain technology to their businesses and administrative models. In June, the Reserve Bank of India was reported to be developing a blockchain platform for banking in its R&D branch and just recently, the Indian government signed a memorandum of understanding with the Bahrain Economic Development Board to establish a framework for the joint promotion of blockchain-based financial technology.
