UPSC Prelims Practice Questions — NSO Launches MCP Server to Make Government Data AI Ready

Q1. The beta Model Context Protocol (MCP) server for the eSankhyiki portal was launched by which one of the following bodies?

  • A. National Statistics Office (NSO) under MoSPI
  • B. National Informatics Centre (NIC) under MeitY
  • C. National Data and Analytics Platform (NDAP) under NITI Aayog
  • D. Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI)

Q2. In the context of India's official statistics, 'eSankhyiki' is best described as which one of the following?

  • A. A one-stop national web portal of MoSPI for accessing and disseminating official statistics
  • B. A statutory commission that conducts the decennial Census of India
  • C. A mobile application used exclusively to field the Periodic Labour Force Survey
  • D. A cloud data centre operated by the RBI for macroeconomic indicators

Q3. Which of the following are correctly identified as data products offered under the eSankhyiki portal's Data Catalogue module?

  1. Household Consumption Expenditure Survey (HCES)
  2. Multiple Indicator Survey (MIS)
  3. Wholesale Price Index (WPI)
  4. National Accounts Statistics (NAS)
  • A. 1 and 3 only
  • B. 2 and 4 only
  • C. 1, 2 and 4
  • D. 3 and 4 only

Q4. Of the seven data products available on the NSO's MCP beta server, which one yields India's headline (retail) inflation figure?

  • A. Consumer Price Index (CPI)
  • B. Wholesale Price Index (WPI)
  • C. Index of Industrial Production (IIP)
  • D. National Account Statistics (NAS)

Q5. The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) is organised into how many wings?

  • A. Two
  • B. Three
  • C. Four
  • D. Five

Q6. The 2026 launch of the NSO MCP server is regarded as India's first formal integration of its official statistical infrastructure with which one of the following?

  • A. Agentic AI and large language model (LLM) workflows
  • B. The Unified Payments Interface (UPI)
  • C. Distributed-ledger (blockchain) networks
  • D. The Aadhaar biometric authentication database

Q7. With reference to the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS), which of the following statements is/are correctly identified?

  1. It is conducted by the National Statistical Office (NSO).
  2. Labour Force Participation Rate (LFPR) and Worker Population Ratio (WPR) are among the indicators it estimates.
  3. From January 2025, the redesigned PLFS provides monthly and quarterly labour-force estimates.
  4. It was first launched in 2011 by the Reserve Bank of India.
  • A. 1 and 4 only
  • B. 1, 2 and 3
  • C. 2, 3 and 4
  • D. 3 and 4 only

Q8. The Model Context Protocol (MCP) server launched by the NSO initially exposes official statistics through how many data products in its beta version?

  • A. Five
  • B. Six
  • C. Seven
  • D. Nine