ONOS Year 1: 11.3 Crore Research Papers Downloaded, IIT Madras Leads

Data from the Ministry of Education shows that IIT Madras recorded the highest number of downloads at 40.3 lakh, followed by IISc Bangalore with 28.3 lakh downloads. Among central universities, Banaras Hindu University (15.3 lakh) and Delhi University (14.2 lakh) were among the leading users of the national research access platform.

Approved by the Union Cabinet in November 2024 and formally launched on January 1, 2025, ONOS is a Central Sector Scheme designed to provide countrywide access to international scholarly journals and research publications.

The scheme enables students, faculty members and researchers in government higher education institutions and central government R&D institutions to access academic journals without paying subscription fees.

Under the initiative, the Central government directly pays publishers, eliminating subscription costs for universities and departments. The government has allocated nearly Rs 6,000 crore for the scheme, which has been approved for three calendar years, 2025, 2026 and 2027.

According to official data, users are downloading around one crore research articles every month through the platform.

The scheme currently includes 30 major international academic publishers, whose journals are accessible through the ONOS platform. These include globally recognised publishers such as Elsevier ScienceDirect, Springer Nature, Wiley, Taylor & Francis, IEEE, Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, American Chemical Society, American Physical Society, BMJ, Sage Publishing and Project Muse, among others.

Usage data indicates that Elsevier ScienceDirect accounted for the largest share of downloads with 4.4 crore articles (37 per cent), followed by Springer with 2.2 crore downloads (18 per cent). Journals from the American Chemical Society recorded 1.4 crore downloads (12 per cent), while Wiley accounted for 1.1 crore (9 per cent), Taylor & Francis for 0.8 crore (6 per cent), and IEEE for 0.6 crore (5 per cent). In total, downloads from the platform crossed 11.5 crore during 2025.

The ONOS scheme has also expanded access to academic resources significantly. Before its launch, different ministries operated separate journal subscription consortia, resulting in fragmented access.

Ten major library networks existed earlier, including e-Shodh Sindhu (Department of Higher Education), National Knowledge Resource Consortium (Department of Science and Technology), DeLCON (Department of Biotechnology), ERMED (Ministry of Health and Family Welfare), DERCON (Ministry of Earth Sciences), CERA (Ministry of Agriculture), DRDO consortium (Ministry of Defence), Department of Atomic Energy, Department of Space, and the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology consortium.

Together, these consortia subscribed to around 8,000 journals. With ONOS, this has increased to more than 13,000 journals, significantly expanding the range of research publications available to users.

The scheme has also consolidated the system from 10 separate consortia to a single national subscription framework. The number of beneficiaries has grown from 55 lakh users earlier to around one crore, while the number of participating higher education institutions has expanded from about 2,300 to nearly 5,800 institutions.

While the earlier consortia collectively spent around Rs 850 crore annually, the new national subscription framework has an annual outlay of around Rs 1,800 crore.

The ONOS initiative is limited to government-run institutions and currently covers journal subscriptions only. Items such as books, magazines, economic or statistical databases, and bibliographic databases are not included. Private institutions are also not covered under the scheme.

The platform is operated through a unified digital portal, onos.gov.in, coordinated by the Information and Library Network (INFLIBNET) Centre, an autonomous inter-university centre under the University Grants Commission (UGC). Institutions register on the portal and can access journals through two mechanisms: on-campus access using IP-based authentication, and off-campus remote access using institutional credentials.

Institutions that do not have their own IP infrastructure can use the INFED (Indian Access Management Federation) software developed by INFLIBNET for authentication.

Another component of the scheme supports Indian researchers seeking to publish their work in leading open-access journals. The ONOS portal provides Article Publishing Charges (APC) support for publishing in more than 430 high-quality "gold open access" journals. Researchers whose papers are accepted in these journals can apply through the portal for APC funding.

The scheme will also be periodically reviewed by the Anusandhan National Research Foundation (ANRF), which will monitor usage trends and publications by Indian researchers.

The initiative traces its origins to the Prime Minister's Independence Day address in 2022, when he highlighted the importance of strengthening research and development during the "Amrit Kaal" period and gave the call of "Jai Anusandhan". The National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 had also emphasised research as a key component of higher education reform.

Officials say the scheme has opened access to global research publications for nearly one crore students, faculty members, scientists and researchers across disciplines, including those in Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities, thereby encouraging both core and interdisciplinary research across the country.

Usage statistics show wide participation across institutions. Apart from IIT Madras and IISc Bangalore, other institutions with significant downloads include Jawaharlal Nehru University (7.3 lakh), Institute of Chemical Technology (6.7 lakh), Pondicherry University (6.4 lakh), Tata Institute of Fundamental Research Mumbai (6.3 lakh), Central University of Punjab (6.2 lakh), Aligarh Muslim University (4.9 lakh) and North Eastern Hill University (2.7 lakh).

Among State universities, Anna University (7.8 lakh downloads) recorded the highest usage, followed by Punjab University (7.4 lakh), Jadavpur University (7.1 lakh), Mahatma Gandhi University (5.8 lakh), Cochin University of Science and Technology (5.5 lakh), Tamil Nadu Veterinary and Animal Sciences University (5.3 lakh), Calcutta University (5.2 lakh), University of Madras (4.1 lakh), Bihar Animal Sciences University (3.7 lakh), Savitribai Phule Pune University (3.1 lakh), Maharshi Dayanand University (3.1 lakh) and University of Kerala (3 lakh).

The government has indicated that some publishers not currently part of the scheme, including Royal Society of Chemistry, World Scientific Publishing, JoVE, INFORMS, Economic and Political Weekly, and Optical Society of America, have expressed interest in joining the initiative in future phases.

- ANI