New Delhi, Aug. 17 -- One of the common themes of regimes in power at the Centre is a drive to standardize or make uniform some important aspects of policy and process throughout India. This drive is not partisan, in the sense that both major national parties have shown their propensity to do this over the decades. One could argue that this drive has gotten stronger in recent years, most likely enabled by digital technology that makes things possible which couldn't have been imagined earlier.

This uniformity drive includes some procedures that have been established for many years, such as national examination systems for engineering (JEE for central institutions), medicine (NEET for all medical colleges), civil services (the UPSC exam), ...