New Delhi: Researchers from Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT)-Madras and Bombay along with Harvard University are using big data to build India’s first comprehensive database on infrastructure projects called Integrated Database on Infrastructure Projects (IDIP). 

The mapping of infrastructure projects will include the entire infrastructure sector and all types of central, state projects and public private partnership (PPP) ventures. It will also cover all phases of the project-—project design and formulation, development, construction as well as operation. 

“This is being envisaged in Integrated Database on Infrastructure Projects in India which is likely to be launched in a month’s time,” said Thillai Rajan A, a faculty of the department of management studies at IIT Madras. 

The researchers are also collaborating with the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), state governments and private sector infrastructure developers. “We are in the process of collaborating with government bodies to continuously update the data on operations of various projects, thus making it almost real-time,” he said. India’s infrastructure sector is one of the largest in the world, with the recent Economic Survey pegging the country’s infrastructure development needs at $4.5 trillion by 2040. 

Researchers, policymakers, corporations, investment agencies and others associated with the core sector would be able to access this database to study and analyse the trends in the sector almost on real-time basis, said Rajan. 

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