We have deliberately not answered this, and we would like to explain why before asking for help with it.
Why we have not decided
Choosing an institutional form early would bend the research to fit the vehicle. A design that assumes government operation looks different from one that assumes a protocol with many operators, and we do not yet know enough to choose well.
So the work is being done to remain useful across several possible futures.
The questions inside the question
- Is this digital public infrastructure, a protocol, a government system, or something else?
- Could several operators coexist? What would they have to agree on?
- Who sets standards, and who certifies conformance?
- Who is accountable when it fails, and to whom?
- What is government's role: infrastructure provider, regulator, standard setter, funder, guarantor, purchaser, operator, data steward, convenor? Several of these? Not all are the same choice
- What would need to exist in law for any of this to operate?
What we are fairly sure of
Government involvement is structural rather than optional. The state already holds identity, public health, surveillance, immunisation, insurance, primary care, regulation, financing and workforce. No serious design can route around that.
But structural involvement does not mean government operates every component, and conflating those two would be a mistake.
What would count as an answer
A realistic account of what could actually be established in India, by whom, and what it would take. Ideally from people who have watched something similar succeed or fail from the inside.
Help us with this
Civil servants, people who have worked on India's digital public infrastructure, and anyone who has built an institution rather than only a system. We would especially like to hear what is impossible and why, before we specify something that cannot exist.