History

There were hardly any statistical activities prior to defacto transfer of the Union Territory with the Indian Union. The statistical tradition dates back to the fifties and is believed to have originated as Bureau till the setting up of the Directorate. Realisation of the need for a suitable statistical organization at the Union Territory level paved the way for the establishment of Directorate of Economics and Statistics with the nomenclature Bureau of Statistics and Evaluation in 1957 at Puducherry, and the subordinate institutions in 1964 at Karaikal and in 1996 at Mahe and Yanam regions. The erstwhile Bureau of Statistics in its early stages achieved considerable success in feeding the statistical information to various user organisations agencies. As time passed, the statistical activities have expanded both vertically and horizontally. It is embracing wider and wider fields of action. The First Conference of the State Ministers of Statistics held at New Delhi on 5th April, 1981 has recommended that the Bureau of Economics and Statistics in the States/Union Territories should be renamed as "Directorate of Economics and Statistics". Accordingly, the Bureau of Economics and Statistics, Puducherry has been redesignated as Directorate of Economics and Statistics, Puducherry as per G.O. Ms. No.88/82/F2 dataed 22-4-1982 of Finance Department, Puducherry. The statistical system was reinforced continuously under reoriented programmes of human resource development and the technological skills of the statistical personnel were upgraded. Based on the suggestion made by the Government of India about the need for bringing uniformity among State Statistical Bureaus on the administrative and operational structure of the organizations for active participation in the nation build up the present Directorate of Economics and Statistics came into being in 1981. The Directorate of Economics and Statistics has a network of about 190 staff at different levels in all the four regions with the Head office at Puducherry, one Regional office at Karaikal and two statistical cells one each at Mahe and Yanam regions. The status of the Directorate of Economics and Statistics has now been upgraded with the nomination of member in most of the national committees so as to enable the Directorate to discharge the functions more effectively. The organization in the past 51 years has witnessed continuous growth and has ensured timely generation of quality and quantitative statistics. The Statistical Units have also been set up in almost all the Departments/Agencies mainly with a view to revitalize the activities of the Directorate and for meeting the growing demand for Statistical data.