India has emerged as a global leader in leveraging technology for widespread governance solutions, with notable achievements such as the Aadhaar biometric identity program and the Unified Payments Interface (UPI). Building on this success, the country is now poised to apply a similar approach to artificial intelligence (AI) through its Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) strategy.
Minister of State for Electronics, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, emphasized the need for India to possess its own sovereign AI capabilities. He outlined the government's vision, stating that merely having an AI ecosystem driven by global giants or domestic startups is not sufficient. India aims to establish a robust AI compute infrastructure, encompassing both hardware and software, to address real-life use cases in healthcare, agriculture, governance, language translation, and more.
The Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) took a significant step last May by proposing the creation of the National Data Governance Framework Policy. This policy includes the establishment of an India Datasets platform, housing non-personal and anonymized datasets from various government entities. The platform's objective is to provide accessibility to startups and researchers, fostering AI and data-led innovation in the country.
A working group report released in October described the India datasets program as a unified national data sharing and exchange platform, accommodating diverse stakeholders ranging from governments to startups. Furthermore, it indicated that non-personal data held by this platform could be monetized, playing a pivotal role in boosting India's AI ecosystem by providing a solid foundation for data-driven innovation and development.
Recognizing the transformative potential of AI in the digital economy, India is shaping its regulatory framework. Chandrasekhar highlighted that India's approach will be a hybrid of Europe's citizen-centric regulations and the US market-focused regulations. The country is considering a directive, possibly part of the upcoming Digital India Bill, to compel major tech companies like Facebook, Google, and Amazon to share anonymized personal data with a government-backed database.
This directive aims to deposit non-personal data held by these tech giants into the India datasets platform, aligning with the recommendations of a MeitY-appointed committee chaired by Kris Gopalakrishnan. The committee, in its draft report of January 2021, proposed the identification and sharing of "high value datasets" to encourage innovation while safeguarding national security.
As India charts its course toward AI sovereignty, these strategic initiatives reflect a commitment to harnessing the economic benefits of AI and fostering a dynamic and innovative digital landscape. The convergence of regulatory frameworks, data-sharing platforms, and a focus on AI use cases positions India as a key player in the global AI revolution.
