The Central government has introduced a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server to facilitate linking of Artificial Intelligence tools with Official Statistical databases.
The newly launched MCP server allows access to verified government data through Artificial Intelligence applications and platforms, with the National Statistical Portal e-Sankhyiki.
The Beta version of the MCP server which included seven key statistical products (such as the Periodic Labour Force Survey, Consumer Price Index, Annual Survey of Industries, Index of Industrial Production, National Accounts Statistics), has now been extended for 21 products available on the eSankhyiki portal.
This information was given by Minister of State for Statistics and Programme Implementation Rao Inderjit Singh in the Rajya Sabha on Monday.
In another reply, he said his ministry has strengthened the measurement framework of the Consumer Price Index (CPI) through a comprehensive base revision from 2012=100 to 2024=100, using the latest Household Consumption Expenditure Survey (HCES) 2023–24 to update the CPI item basket and weights.
The key enhancements in base revision exercise include expansion in coverage, methodological refinements, adoption of international classification system and inclusion of administrative and e-commerce data in CPI to make CPI more robust and representative.
Keeping in view the adequate representativeness and feasibility of data collection, the sample markets in both rural and urban areas are increased from 2295 to 2860 in CPI 2024 series.
As capturing the price trends on the e-commerce platforms has become important because of its growing use by the Indian households, 12 online markets are also added across 12 biggest towns of the country, having more than 25 lakh population as per census 2011 to capture price variations of the items on the e-commerce/online platforms
The prices of items are collected through online/e- commerce platforms on a weekly basis. All items of CPI baskets are mapped with the corresponding most popular e-commerce platform for price collection by the respective regional offices of Field Operations Division (FOD) of MoSPI. Keeping in view the volatility of prices on e-commerce platforms, prices are collected in all four weeks on identified days and time slots. A monthly average price using these weekly transaction price observations are used in CPI compilation.