In certain regions of Maharashtra, India, Polygon blockchain technology is being employed to issue caste certificates. The residents of Etapalli village and Gadchiroli district are among the first to receive these certificates through LegitDoc, a platform based on the Polygon blockchain, ensuring instant verifiability. This initiative by the Maharashtra government targets the economically disadvantaged and tribal populations in the central Indian state, aligning with the ‘Digital India’ initiative to explore on-chain e-governance.
Under this program, a total of 65,000 caste certificates will be issued in Maharashtra, facilitating access to government schemes for underprivileged individuals. The move to bring Web 3 technology into the documentation process is aimed at preventing forgeries and ensuring that government benefits reach the intended recipients.
According to Maharashtra authorities, implementing Web 3 technology in this crucial documentation process is designed to “curb the menace of forgeries” and “identify the right beneficiaries for delivery of government schemes.”
Shubham Gupta, Assistant Collector in Etapalli, highlighted the significance of this implementation in a LinkedIn post, stating that it sets a precedent for India to lead in building technology stacks on neutral Web 3 platforms—decentralized and resistant to de-platforming, offering alternatives to the censorship-prone digital tech stacks dominated by the United States and China.
The use of public blockchains provides a new dimension to the Internet, allowing information to be openly shareable and openly unfalsifiable. This approach can disrupt traditional methods of societal record-keeping, identity management, payments, remittances, accounting, fundraisers, and more, as mentioned in Gupta’s post.
Indian authorities have been exploring blockchain technology for various applications. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is developing a blockchain-based Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) to introduce Indians to the new digital assets category while mitigating the risks associated with volatile cryptocurrencies.
The choice of Polygon as the blockchain for this initiative is attributed to its status as an India-based Ethereum scaling and infrastructure development platform.
