The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, Government of India, has been disseminating microdata from its surveys and censuses since long. This web-based survey cataloging system is powered by the   National Data Archive (NADA) software developed by the International Household Survey Network (IHSN). This system serves as a portal for researchers to browse, search, and download relevant census or survey documents and metadata.

The Microdata Archive provides web based access to the complete metadata of over 154 surveys and censuses conducted under the National Sample Survey (NSS) programme, Annual Survey of Industries (ASI) and the Economic Census currently available with the Ministry. Efforts are on to include metadata of surveys conducted by the State Governments and other government agencies.

The metadata now provided in the archive includes, survey methodology, sampling procedures, questionnaires, instructions, survey reports, classifications, code directories etc. Importantly the archive provides all details of the data files that are disseminated to users along with case summaries.