About Standing Committee on Statistics:
- It was formed in 2019 to provide a new internal oversight mechanism for official data, revamping a Standing Committee on Economic Statistics (SCES).
- Need:
- The development assumes significance amid sharp critiques of India’s statistical machinery by members of the Economic Advisory Council (EAC) to the PM.
- The EAC’s chairperson (Bibek Debroy) had mooted an overhaul of the system and contended that the Indian Statistical Service has “little expertise in survey design”.
- Terms of reference:
- To ensure more coverage, the panel can have up to 16 members.
- To expand the mandate beyond economic data and advise the Ministry on technical aspects of all surveys, such as sampling, design, survey methodology and finalisation of results.
- To identify data gapsthat need to be filled by official statistics, along with an appropriate strategy to plug those gaps.
- To explore the use of administrative statistics to improve data outcomes.
- Role to be played by NSC: While the panel will help finalise survey results, the NSC will have the ultimate authority to approve the publication of those results.
