Amid doubts, Govt sets up panel to review conduct of surveys

“The committee’s function is to design all data collection, data production efforts. It is to make sure that whatever data is collected in MoSPI, meets the standards of good statistics. That’s our job,” Sen told The Indian Express.

The committee has also been mandated to provide guidance to conduct pilot surveys/ pre-testing, if necessary, before finalising schedules for data collection. It will also provide guidance for studying and exploring the availability of administrative statistics relating to surveys/statistics and provide guidance to study/identify data gaps/additional data requirements, if any, for surveys/statistics and suggest appropriate strategies for improvement. Wherever participation from states will be there, the committee can also provide technical guidance to the central and state-level agencies for the surveys.

The new committee comes at a time when India’s statistical system is under criticism, especially from three members of the Economic Advisory Council to the PM (EAC-PM) including Chairman Bibek Debroy and members Shamika Ravi and Sanjeev Sanyal.

In a column in The Indian Express earlier this month, Ravi had questioned the data quality of surveys, noting that it is imperative surveys for estimates related to poverty, growth, employment, and unemployment should be conducted at regular intervals in a predetermined timely manner and should be of the highest quality.

Pointing out that all major surveys in India that were conducted post-2011 and used the Census 2011 for the sampling frame have overestimated the proportion of the rural population significantly, Ravi said, “These surveys use outdated sampling frames and hence, are not representative. In fact, the survey mechanisms are archaic and not adapted for rapid changes. As a consequence, these surveys grossly and systematically underestimate India’s progress and development and the misleading estimates from these surveys impede policy-making. Framing policies based on these estimates are unlikely to yield the desired results and we will continue to see a gap between ground realities and survey estimates.”

In response, Pronab Sen wrote in this newspaper that the criticism of sample surveys was misplaced and data differ from Census count because definitions are different.

The earlier SCES formed in December 2019 had 28 members and was mandated to review the framework for economic indicators pertaining to the industrial sector, the services sector and the labour force statistic including datasets such as the Periodic Labour Force Survey, the Annual Survey of Industries, the Annual Survey of Services Sector Enterprises, the Annual Survey of Unorganised Sector Enterprises, Time Use Survey, Index of Service Production, Index of Industrial Production, Economic Census. The new SCoS now will review all surveys.

As of now, the SCoS has 14 members, out of which there are four non-official members, nine official members and a member secretary. The total number of members in the committee can be 16, the order stated, adding that it is extendable based on the requirement from time to time.

Other members of the committee include Sonalde Desai, Professor, National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER); Biswanath Goldar, former Professor, Institute of Economic Growth; S K Sasi Kumar, former Senior Fellow, VV Giri National Labour Institute; S Chandrasekhar, Professor, Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research; Tauqeer Ahmad, Head of Division, Division of Sample Surveys, ICAR-Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute; Sandip Mitra, Associate Professor, Indian Statistical Institute; Mausumi Bose, professor, Applied Statistics Unit, Indian Statistical Institute; Executive Director (ED) or his representative, Modelling and Forecasting Division, Department of Statistics & Information Management, Reserve Bank of India along with officials from MoSPI.