Last week India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) unveiled India’s National Blockchain Framework. It has several purposes, including providing a platform for government departments to develop solutions and a light weight platform for rapid prototyping by researchers and small businesses.
Vishvasya is the National Blockchain Technology stack providing Blockchain as a Service (BaaS). This allows users to spin up nodes and networks and develop smart contracts, including several templates. For external developers who need to consume the blockchain apps, the stack provides APIs for access.
So far it supports two permissioned blockchains, but didn’t mention which ones. When we reported that MeitY was working on this project last year, the blockchains were Hyperledger Fabric and Hyperledger Sawtooth.
Several government departments have already developed solutions ranging from judiciary applications to document certification and tracking agriculture produce.
One app that was promoted is Praamaanik, which uses blockchain to verify mobile app security. The application developers provide an electronic fingerprint of their mobile app, which is registered on the blockchain. When users download the app, they can verify that it’s exactly the same and hasn’t been tampered with by using a verification mobile app. For many years the software community has cryptographically signed software builds. Checking the signature required a little technical skill, whereas India’s solution provides an option that anyone can master.
Apart from MeitY, other organizations involved in the development include C-DAC, NIC, IDRBT Hyderabad (for research in banking technologyset up by the central bank), IIT Hyderabad, IIIT Hyderabad (3 Is), and SETS Chennai.
This project has similarities with Europe’s EBSI, which provides a platform for government solutions. There’s also some cross over with China’s domestic Blockchain-based Service Network (BSN), which was designed to provide a low cost blockchain infrastructure for small companies.
