With the vision of making AI in India and making AI work for India, the Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday approved the IndiaAI Mission with a budget outlay of Rs 10,371.92 crore to strengthen the AI innovation ecosystem in India.
IndiaAI Mission Overview
"The IndiaAI mission will establish a comprehensive ecosystem catalyzing AI innovation through strategic programs and partnerships across the public and private sectors," the cabinet release said. "By democratizing computing access, improving data quality, developing indigenous AI capabilities, attracting top AI talent, enabling industry collaboration, providing startup risk capital, ensuring socially impactful AI projects and bolstering ethical AI, it will drive responsible, inclusive growth of India's AI ecosystem," it added.
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Key Components
Reportedly, the Mission will be implemented by ‘IndiaAI’ Independent Business Division (IBD) under Digital India Corporation (DIC) and has the following seven key components:
IndiaAI Compute Capacity: Building a scalable AI computing infrastructure, including an AI marketplace offering AI as a service and pre-trained models. The ecosystem will comprise AI compute infrastructure of 10,000 or more Graphics Processing Units (GPUs), built through public-private partnership.
IndiaAI Innovation Centre: Development and deployment of indigenous Large Multimodal Models (LMMs) and domain-specific foundational models in critical sectors.
IndiaAI Datasets Platform: Streamlining access to quality non-personal datasets for AI innovation. A unified data platform will be developed to provide a one-stop solution for seamless access to non-personal datasets to Indian Startups and Researchers.
IndiaAI Application Development Initiative: Promotion of AI applications in critical sectors for the problem statements sourced from Central Ministries, State Departments, and other institutions. The initiative will focus on developing/scaling/promoting adoption of impactful AI solutions
IndiaAI FutureSkills: Increasing AI courses in academic programs and setting up Data and AI Labs in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities across India to impart foundational level courses.
IndiaAI Startup Financing: Supporting deep-tech AI startups with streamlined access to funding.
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Safe and Trusted AI: Recognizing the need for adequate guardrails to advance the responsible development, deployment, and adoption of AI, the Safe and Trusted AI pillar will enable the implementation of Responsible AI projects including the development of indigenous tools and frameworks, self-assessment checklists for innovators, and other guidelines and governance frameworks.
The government said the IndiaAI Mission is expected to drive inclusive growth, create highly skilled job opportunities, and enhance India's global competitiveness in AI technology.
