Baby Rajaram Bokale is no ordinary woman. The 53-year-old from Maharashtra's Kharadi suburb manages her house, runs a small business grinding spices, and teaches Marathi to Microsoft's artificial intelligence (AI) tools. For this, she also gets a fee of $5 (about Rs 400) per hour. After having worked for 11 days, Bokale earned Rs 2,000.
“I used what I earned to buy a part and repair my grinder,” she said. “That’s money I wouldn’t normally have.”
Every night, after a long day of work, Bokale devotes about an hour to record her voice in Marathi.
"She settles cross-legged on her bed... opens an app in her smartphone, and in her clear, resonant voice, she begins to read a story aloud in her native tongue, Marathi, the language of Maharashtra state, where she lives in Kharadi, a bustling suburban neighborhood in the city of Pune," Microsoft stated in its blog.
Bokale is among other members of a social impact organisation that has partnered with Microsoft to train AI models in Marathi.
"In India, if you don’t speak Hindi or English, it can be difficult to access technology that helps people thrive – apps, tools and digital assistants that English and Hindi speakers take for granted," the tech giant stated. "The fact that hundreds of millions of potential customers could benefit from those technologies is why Microsoft and others are in a race to make their products available in those 'under-resourced' languages."
“I’m really proud that my voice is getting recorded, and someone is about to learn Marathi thanks to my voice,” Bokale said, “and also proud that it will make these tools and features available in Marathi.”
But, while teaching Marathi to the AI tools, Bokale has at the same time been learning valuable lessons for herself -- the stories she reads are about how banks work, how to save, and how to avoid scammers and frauds. They are designed to deliver practical information in an entertaining way, Microsoft stated.
Bokale has now learned to pay for items with the UPI payment system and how to use the phone for banking. “Now I’m able to do more interesting things with my smartphone,” she said.
Read more: Satya Nadella highlights how Indian villagers are helping Microsoft develop AI tools
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