The Indian Statistical Institute Bill, 2026 rewrites the legal foundation of the Indian Statistical Institute in Kolkata, replacing the Indian Statistical Institute Act, 1959. ISI is one of the country’s oldest centres for teaching and research in statistics, and it trains many of the people who go on to build India’s official data systems. Today the Institute is still technically a society registered under West Bengal law, and the Bill converts it into a body corporate constituted directly by Parliament and run on a not for profit basis.
The new governance design puts the President of India in the role of Visitor, with powers to review the Institute’s working and order inquiries. A Board of Governors becomes the main policy body, chaired by an eminent academic or industry figure, supported by an Academic Council, a Finance Committee and management councils for the Institute’s various centres. The stated objects widen beyond classical statistics to interdisciplinary research and closer collaboration between industry, academia and government.
It also loosens central control in two ways that matter. The government’s power to take over the Institute is narrowed, and prior approval is required only for the first set of regulations rather than for every later amendment. That is a meaningful shift toward academic autonomy for a publicly funded institution.