India Plans To Develop Its Own 'Sovereign AI': Here's What We Know So Far

In a strategic move towards bolstering its technological prowess, India is set to extend its Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) model to artificial intelligence (AI), aiming for sovereign AI capabilities.

As reported by Indian Express, Minister of State for Electronics, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, has emphasised the need for a dedicated AI ecosystem beyond reliance on global players.

The DPI model, successful with Aadhaar and Unified Payments Interface (UPI), involves the government-sanctioning underlying technology, later leveraged by private entities for various applications.

Now, India seeks to replicate this success in AI, focusing on real-life applications in healthcare, agriculture, governance, language translation, and more.

Chandrasekhar highlighted the government's commitment to not merely competing in generative AI but also prioritising real-world applications to drive economic development.

“We are determined that we must have our own sovereign AI. We can take two options. One is to say, as long as there is an AI ecosystem in India whether that is driven by Google, Meta, Indian startups, and Indian companies, we should be happy about it. But we certainly don’t think that is enough,” the minister said during an event organised by the Financial Express on Wednesday (29 November).

Last May, the Ministry of Electronics and IT proposed the National Data Governance Framework Policy, envisioning the creation of an India Datasets platform, housing non-personal and anonymised datasets accessible to startups and researchers.

In addressing AI regulation, Chandrasekhar outlined a hybrid approach, combining elements of Europe's focus on citizens' rights and the US approach centered on market regulation.