Centre launches 2 digital platforms to modernise India's addressing system

New Delhi, May 27 (IANS) The government on Tuesday launched two transformative digital platforms — ‘Know Your DIGIPIN’ and ‘Know Your PIN Code’ — marking a significant step towards the modernisation of India's addressing system and geospatial governance.

These platforms were launched in alignment with the National Geospatial Policy 2022, which envisions the development of an advanced geospatial infrastructure to support digital governance and public service delivery.

“The launch of these two applications reflects our government’s unwavering commitment to digital transformation and precision governance. DIGIPIN, in particular, will redefine how we perceive addresses, ensuring that every citizen, even in the remotest part of the country, is digitally locatable and serviceable,” said Vandita Kaul, Secretary, Department of Posts.

The DIGIPIN (Digital Postal Index Number) is an open-source, interoperable, geo-coded, grid-based digital address system developed by the Department of Posts in collaboration with IIT Hyderabad and NRSC, ISRO.

It is a cornerstone of the Department of Posts' vision to offer Address-as-a-Service (AaaS) — an array of services associated with address data management to support secure and efficient interactions between users, government entities, and private sector organisations.

The ‘Know Your DIGIPIN’ portal enables users to retrieve their DIGIPIN based on precise geolocation, and input latitude and longitude coordinates to fetch corresponding DIGIPINs and vice versa.

This initiative simplifies location mapping, enhances logistics and emergency response, and ensures last-mile delivery, especially in rural and underserved areas.

The DIGIPIN system, officially reviewed and adopted by the Thematic Working Group on Address under the National Geospatial Policy 2022, is now available to all Ministries, State Governments, institutions for integration into their workflows, and users for their own use, said the Department of Posts, Ministry of Communications.

Incorporating DIGIPIN as an additional address attribute enables the leveraging of GIS capabilities, laying the foundation for future GIS-based digitalisation of service delivery across various organisations in a cost-effective manner.

DIGIPIN will enhance location accuracy across multiple sectors by providing precise geographic coordinates, ensuring accurate service delivery and reducing emergency response times.

The six-digit PIN Code system, introduced in 1972, has served as the backbone of India’s postal delivery.

However, recognising the need to modernise and refine its geographic accuracy, the Department undertook a national geofencing exercise across all postal jurisdictions to geo-reference all the pin code boundaries of the country.

Based on this, the Department of Post has now launched the ‘Know Your PIN Code’ web application which uses GNSS location features to allow users to identify the correct PIN Code based on the location and submit feedback on PIN Code accuracy for continuous refinement of pin code dataset.

The geo-fenced PIN Code boundaries dataset has also been uploaded on Open Government Data Platform under the title “All India PIN Code Boundary geo-json”.

With this dual launch, the Department of Posts advances its role not just as a postal service provider but as a critical enabler of Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) for India.

--IANS

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