What is centre's One Nation One Subscription Scheme (ONOS) aimed at benefiting 1.8 crore students, researchers, teachers

The government said the initiative aims to promote research, development and innovation at government universities, colleges and research institutions.

The Union Cabinet has approved the ‘One National One Subscription’ (ONOS) scheme to provide college, university students, teachers, and researchers across the country access to international research articles and journals.

ONOS: What is centre's new One Nation One Subscription Scheme? (Getty Images/iStockphoto/ Representational image)

The centre has allocated around ₹6,000 crore for the scheme for the next three years.

The government said the initiative has been taken to promote research, development and innovation at government universities, colleges, research institutions, and R&D laboratories.

Here are some key features of this new scheme-

• This will be a completely digital process, and access to journals will be provided through a national subscription coordinated by the Information and Library Network (INFLIBNET), an autonomous inter-university centre of the University Grants Commission (UGC). The Department of Higher Education will have a unified portal, “One Nation One Subscription”, through which the institutions will be able to access the journals.

• Thirty (30) major international journal publishers have been included in the One Nation One Subscription scheme. Subscribers will get access to nearly 13,000 e-journals published by them.
• This scheme is expected to benefit nearly 1.8 crore students, faculty, researchers, and scientists of all disciplines, including those in tier 2 and tier 3 cities.

• Both central and state government-funded higher education institutions will be eligible for One Nation One Subscription. The benefit will also be extended to centrally-funded research and development institutions. More than 6,300 HEIs and central government R&D institutions will be covered under the scheme.
• The Anusandhan National Research Foundation (ANRF) will periodically review the usage of subscriptions and publications of Indian authors of user institutions. The higher education department and other ministries that have HEIs and R&D under their management will campaign among students, faculty and researchers about the subscription.