To no one’s surprise, a recent survey announced that India is the 13th most advanced country the world in terms of the development of artificial intelligence technologies. Over the past decade, India has flourished greatly in AI. But what is the reason behind it?
“The road ahead for AI depends on and will be driven by ‘human intentions’. It is our intention that will determine the outcome of AI,” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said after inaugurating the Wadhwani Institute of Artificial Intelligence at the University of Mumbai’s Kalina Campus.
What Makes India So Good?
In the last few years, numerous entrepreneurs have come up with AI-based services in applications ranging from farming to healthcare and education. We have also seen the government undertaking initiatives to adapt AI in its policies as well. It has partnered with several AI institutes to implement AI projects. It is these AI projects that have helped the country do so well in the field. Also, partnering with various reputed international AI institutes has helped the country develop an effective AI strategy.
Government Support: The government has shown great support in leveraging AI. NITI Aayog’s unique brand called #AIforAll is an approach that focuses on how India can leverage the transformative technologies to ensure social and inclusive growth in line with the development philosophy of the government. It aims to enhance and empower human capabilities to address the challenges of access, affordability, shortage and inconsistency of skilled expertise. It also aims to tackle some global challenges from the AI perspective, be it an application, research, development, technology or responsible AI. With this initiative, it has extended its support in the areas of healthcare, agriculture, education, smart cities and infrastructure and smart mobility and transportation sectors. One example of the NITI Aayog using AI is its development of an AI-based crop yield prediction model for a real-time advisory to farmers on crop yield and pest outbreak.
Not just the national government, but the state governments are putting their best foot forward in making use of AI. For example, the Andhra Pradesh government has been using cloud management and data storage in governance to resolve issues of the people in the state.
Talent Pool: There are more than 200 AI-based startups in India that are helping different sectors. It has progressed so much in recent times because experts from a different set of advanced computing power have come together to help areas from farming to healthcare.
Big Indian companies such as Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio are setting up AI labs. Indian IT services giants such as Infosys and Wipro are making huge investments in AI. IT industry body Nasscom is setting up Centre of Excellence (COE) in AI in Karnataka and Telangana with companies like IBM, Microsoft, NVIDIA, Intel and AWS, on the lines of its successful 10,000 Startups program.
Collaborations And Partnerships: There are many collaborations and partnerships that the country involves itself in when dealing with the advancement of AI. These partnerships are not just within the country but also across the globe. Global corporations NVIDIA, Microsoft and Google have all set up AI labs in India. Tech giant Microsoft is working with the state government to predict dropout rates in government schools in the state of Andhra Pradesh. It makes use of AI to predict with some margin of error, who among the current cohort are likely to drop out.
Concluding Note
IT industry body NASSCOM Vice President KS Viswanathan had said that India has formed a policy group to study new technologies and recommend a framework for their adoption. “We all are currently working out on a policy framework on AI.”
India is getting very serious about AI. With a rich spread of talent in the sector of computer science and data science and the related fields, the country is making its mark in the AI world market. With a more success rate, more talent will eventually be pooled into this glamorous field in the country and we are already on our march to raising our rank in the AI competition.
