CoWin platform to be made open source, available to any and all countries: PM Modi in Co-WIN Conclave

Prime Minister Narendra Modi today addressed the CoWIN Global Conclave. The conclave focused on India's offering of the CoWIN platform as a digital tool to the world to combat COVID-19. He underlined India’s commitment to sharing experiences, expertise and resources with the global community. The Prime Minister also expressed India’s eagerness to learn from global practices.

He emphasized the importance of technology in the fight against the pandemic. He said, “Technology is integral to our fight against COVID-19.  Luckily, that software is one area in which there are no resource constraints. That's why India made its Covid tracking and tracing App open source as soon as it was technically feasible.”

The Prime Minister said that given the importance of vaccination, India decided to adopt a completely digital approach while planning its vaccination strategy. This helps people in proving that they have been vaccinated, expediting the normalcy in the post-pandemic globalized world. A safe, secure and trustworthy proof helps people to establish when, where and by whom they have been vaccinated. The Digital approach also helps in tracking the usage of vaccination and minimizes wastage.

Further, in line with India’s philosophy of Vasudev Kutumbkam, the Prime Minister announced that the Covid vaccination platform Cowin would be made open source. Soon, it will be available to countries globally. Having been used in India, he added that it has been tested in the real world for speed and scale. Thus, all countries can be assured of the platform's work-use case.

In the conclave, Dr Harshvardhan, MoHFW said, “Co-WIN is the crown jewel of our Digital India initiative.”

Other personalities that attended and addressed the Co-WIN Global Conclave event included, Shri Alok Saxena, Additional Secretary, MoHFW, Shri Vikas Sheel, Additional Secretary, MoHFW, Shri Pramod Varma, Chief Architect, UIDAI, Dr Vipul Aggarwal, Dy CEO, NHA among others.

Only last week, Dr R S Sharma, the chairman of the empowered group for Covid-19 vaccine administration, said Prime Minister Narendra Modi has directed officials to create an open-source version of the platform and give it free of cost to any country that wants it. “The Cowin platform has become so popular that as many as 50 countries from Central Asia, Latin America, Africa all showed interest in having a CoWIN-like system,” Sharma said at the second Public Health Summit 2021 on ‘Emerging Imperatives in Strengthening Public Health for India’ organised by Confederation of Indian Industry.