Image Credits: Athulya Pillai
From land records modernisation to agricultural data wallets, digital systems increasingly govern land, livelihoods, and welfare in India. Yet, because of the deprioritisation of communities’ lived realities, the systems are wrought with fragmented data practices, weak feedback loops and deepening exclusions. This report, written in collaboration with Common Ground, confronts a critical question: How can we build digital infrastructure that serves communities rather than extracting from them?
Based on participatory research with civil society organisations and experts across Jharkhand and Odisha, the report proposes a framework of infrastructural sovereignty — where communities exercise genuine control over the digital systems mediating their relationship to land, livelihoods, and welfare.
Drawing insights from Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI), Free and Open Source Software (FOSS), and data collectives/data cooperatives, the report recommends a hybrid architecture: standardised core protocols (DPI logic), open collaborative development (FOSS logic), and federated community governance (cooperative logic). Key principles include designing offline-first for unreliable connectivity, embedding governance directly into technical systems, evolving from centralised coordination to federated autonomy, and ensuring every stakeholder derives tangible value.
Success won’t be measured by sophisticated technology or scale alone, but by genuine shifts of power toward communities. The path forward involves translating these principles into concrete governance mechanisms through workshops and sustained engagement with community-facing organisations, technology builders, and ecosystem partners.
