Government to support development of AI chips in PPP model: Rajeev Chandrasekhar

"The final report lays out what will be the core of the India AI strategy envisged sone years ago by PM Modi," said Chandrasekhar.

India is set to support the development of artificial intelligence (AI) chips through a public-private partnership (PPP) model following recommendations of a government-appointed committee, union minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar said on October 13.

The report also suggested that the government use the PPP model to create computing infrastructure of graphics processing units for the use of startups and researchers in the country.

"The final report lays out what will be the core of the India AI strategy envisaged some years ago by PM Modi," the union minister of state for electronics and information technology said.

"The roadmap was not just about generative AI or a fad around ChatGPT or other similar platforms but a “deep multi-year roadmap to make India AI an enabler of $1 trillion digital economy goal, so that AI is applied in real life use cases like agri, health, education, fintech", the minister said.

He said India data sets will be a collection of data and may be one of the largest collections of anonymised data sets, which will be used by Indian researchers and Indian startups to train their model.

Chandrasekhar said that the draft National Strategy on Robotics will be part of the multi-year India AI programme.

The Ministry of Electronics and IT has floated a consultation paper on the National Strategy on Robotics, which is open for public comments till October 31.

The draft paper highlighted the “limited governance mechanisms” for robotics in India and points out the absence of a separate robotics legislation. It recommends setting up an independent agency under the ministry called the Robotics Innovation Unit to lead implementation of the draft strategy.

The draft has provisions on the usage of AI-based surveillance robots, which has raised the eyebrows of digital rights groups.

The ministry recognised manufacturing, healthcare, agriculture and national security as the four priority sectors with “maximum potential of creating large-scale socio-economic impact through robotics adoption.”