In LS, Education Minister delves into ‘One Nation, One Subscription’ implementation

In the Lok Sabha, MPs Sanjay Haribhau Jadhav and Sanjay Uttamrao Deshmukh had raised a question regarding the current status and implementation of the One Nation, One

Subscription initiative.

Responding to the query on Monday, Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said: “The government has launched One Nation, One Subscription (ONOS), a new Central sector scheme to provide access to scholarly research articles and journal publications to all higher educational institutions (HEIs) managed by the Centre, state governments, and research and development institutions of the Central Government. Thirty major international journal publishers have been included in ONOS. More than 6,300 institutions — including government HEIs in tier-2 and tier-3 cities — are covered under the scheme. Access to journals is provided through a national subscription, coordinated by the Information and Library Network (INFLIBNET) — an autonomous inter-university centre of the University Grants Commission (UGC) — through an entirely

digital process.”

A portal (https://onos.gov.in) has been developed for accessing journal articles under the scheme.

“The facility has been developed so that institutions from rural and remote areas can access it through any Internet-enabled computer or mobile device using login ids and passwords. More than 5.5 crore articles have been downloaded from January to June this year. The Government of India has also established a National Knowledge Network (NKN) to provide a secure and robust Indian network that connects knowledge institutions across the country through a high-speed data communication network to encourage sharing of resources and

collaborative research.”

On executive committees, the minister said: “Executive councils have been constituted in all the Central universities under the purview of the Ministry of Education — including the recently established Sammakka Sarakka Central Tribal University. Vacancies in executive councils arise from time to time, and are filled up as per due procedure prescribed in the respective Acts and Statutes. Autonomous institutions, under the purview of the Ministry of Education, are established under the respective Acts of Parliament, and are governed by the provisions of Acts and Statutes. There are enough provisions in the respective Acts/Statutes to minimise administrative delays, take prompt policy decisions, and review functioning to take necessary steps towards making (the councils) more effective.”