Unveiling a national statistical policy on Monday, the ministry of planning and programme implementation also announced the Department of Statistics as the nodal agency for dissemination of all official information.

The move is in consonance with the government's commitment to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for providing an open access to updated government data by the end of the current fiscal. India is a signatory to specialised-data dissemination network (SDDN) of the IMF, under which the member country is obliged to provide updated data on various facets of the economy.

"The exposure of classified information, however, will remain a prerogrative with theconcerned ministry, department or agency until such time when the Right for Information Bill is enacted, which will be hopefully by the end of the current year," said the minister for planning and programme implementation Ram Naik. The decision was approved earlier by the cabinet on September 9.

"The huge time-lag between the final delivery of data and the collection processes almost renders the data unuseful today," said Naik.

It was in concern with these issues as well as the government's committment as given in the national agenda for governance that the following decision was taken, he added.

The policy provides for more liberal access to official statistics by users like pivate agencies, including international community, who will now be able to have easier access to official data simultaneously.

Naik said the move has to be seen in the light of right to information, which is being legislated upon. The legislation would define what is sensitive and classified data. However, the government wantsto be more transparent.

Dissemmination of official statistics in the form of reports, ad-hoc and regular publications as at present will continue, validated data, though unpublished, including unit, household or establishment level data after deleting their identification particulars to maintain confidentiality will be made available to the national and international users in the form of hard copies or on magnetic media on payment basis.

Describing this as a great step forward, the minister also said his government was interested in expeditious generation and dissemination of data more to date users than economic historians.

The government would also be creating a data warehouse so that data seekers are not put to inconvenience. The nodal responsibility of the department of statistics will be discharged in cooperation with the other central ministries and departments, state governments and data collecting agencies.

Naik said that over the period, demand for specific data requirement has beenincreasing. The data producing agencies do not normally release their entire data. Hence, the need for a new policy.

The price of data to be supplied would include the cost of stationery, computer consumable and computer time for sorting information. However, cost of collection and validation of data will not be charged. Postal charges are to be included along with cost of data supplied. Prices should be fixed in Indian currency as well as in sterling pound and US dollar. Foreign currency prices are to be determined using relevant official multiplier fixed from time to time for printed government.