Lok Sabha Question No. 2580 (UNSTARRED), answered on 2024-12-11
Subject: IndiaAI Mission
Ministry: ELECTRONICS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
Asked by: Shri Shashank Mani

## GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF ELECTRONICS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

## LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 2580

TO BE ANSWERED ON: 11.12.2024

## INDIAAI MISSION

## 2580.   SHRI SHASHANK MANI:

Will the Minister of Electronics and Information Technology be pleased to state:

- (a) the salient features of the IndiaAI Mission along with the targets set thereunder;
- (b) whether any funds have been allocated for the IndiaAI Mission, if so, the details thereof and if not, the reasons therefor;
- (c) whether any funds have been specifically segregated for the IndiaAI Compute Capacity pillar of the Mission, if so, the details thereof and if not, the reasons therefor; and
- (d) whether the Government has any mechanism in place to ensure the effectiveness of the Mission and its financial outlay, if so, the details thereof and if not, the reasons therefor?

## ANSWER

## MINISTER OF STATE FOR ELECTRONICS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (SHRI JITIN PRASADA)

(a) to (d):The Government of India emphasizes the concept of 'AI for All,' aligning with the Prime Minister's vision to democratize the use of technology. This initiative aims to ensure that AI benefits all sectors of society, driving innovation and growth.

Union  Cabinet  led  by  Hon'ble  Prime  Minister  has  approved  the  IndiaAI  Mission  on  7 th March 2024, a strategic initiative to establish a robust and inclusive AI ecosystem that aligns with the country's development goals. This mission is driven by a vision to position India as a global leader in artificial intelligence by focusing on seven foundational pillars.

The Mission is being implemented by IndiaAI Independent Business Division (IBD) under Digital  India  Corporation,  and  key  actions  undertaken  for  implementation  of  the  IndiaAI Mission are as below:

## IndiaAI Compute:

-  IndiaAI compute pillar envisions building a high-end scalable AI computing ecosystem comprising  AI  compute  infrastructure  of  10,000  or  more  Graphics  Processing  Units (GPUs).
-  Applications  were  invited  for  empanelment  of  agencies  for  providing  AI  services  on Cloud on 16th August 2024. The bid submission was closed on 28th November 2024 and 19 bidders have submitted bids in response to the request.

## IndiaAI FutureSkills:

-  IndiaAI FutureSkills Pillar envisions to augment the number of graduates, post-graduate and PhDs in AI domain. Further, it envisions setting up Data and AI Labs in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities across India, to impart foundational-level courses in Data and AI.
-  IndiaAI fellowship are being awarded annually to 400 B.Tech and 500 M.Tech students working  in  AI  domain  from  All  India  Council  for  Technical  Education  (AICTE) recognized engineering institutions.
-  Top  50  National  Institutional  Ranking  Framework  (NIRF)  ranked  research  institutes have been asked to take new PhD scholars under IndiaAI PhD fellowship
-  A  model  IndiaAI  Data  Lab  in  the  National  Institute  of  Electronics  &  Information Technology (NIELIT's), Delhi has been set up, which acts as a reference point for the infrastructure to be set up in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities as a part of the initiative.
-  All  the  36  States  and  Union  Territories  (UTs)  have  been  requested  to  submit  their nominated list of Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs)/Polytechnics located in Tier 2 and Tier  3  cities  for  setting  up  of  Data  Labs.  Additionally,  IndiaAI  in  collaboration  with NIELIT plans to  establish  27  data  labs  in  Tier  2  and  Tier  3  cities  across  the  country, details of which are placed at Appendix I.

## IndiaAI Startup Financing:

-  IndiaAI  Startup  Financing  pillar  is  to  provide  support  to  AI  startups  at  all  stages. Multiple rounds of stakeholder consultations have been held to deliberate on the scheme for supporting AI Startups at Pre-Seed, Seed and Growth stage.

## IndiaAI Innovation Centre:

-  IndiaAI  Innovation  centre  aims  to  develop  and  deploy  indigenous  Large  Multimodal Models (LMMs) trained on India-specific data
-  Multiple  rounds  of  stakeholder  consultations  have  been  held  to  deliberate  on  the IndiaAI's strategy for building indigenous Large Multi-model Models (LMMs).

## IndiaAI Datasets Platform:

-  The IndiaAI Datasets Platform (IDP) seeks to enhance access, quality, and utilization of public sector datasets to make them AI-ready.
-  A comprehensive plan has been created for developing platform and a feature list has been finalized after evaluating other prominent dataset platforms such as Hugging Face, Dubai Pulse etc.

## IndiaAI Applications Development Initiative:

-  IndiaAI  Application  Development  Initiative  aims  to  develop,  scale,  and  promote  the adoption of impactful AI solutions to effectively tackle significant problem statements.
-  IndiaAI  Innovation  challenge  was  launched  on  13th  August  2024  for  the  themes  of healthcare, agriculture, improved governance, climate change & disaster managementandassistive technologies for learning disabilities. The Innovation Challenge was open to Indian innovators, startups, non-profits, students, academic/R&D organizations, and companies. A total of 900 applications have been received across the five focus areas by the deadline of 30th September.
-  CyberGuard  AI  Hackathon  was  launched  on  17th  October  2024  for  Cybercrime prevention in collaboration with the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (I4C) and in response 263 responses have been received.

## Safe & Trusted AI:

-  This  pillar  enables  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.
-  Eight Responsible AI Projects have been selected to address the need for robust guardrails to ensure the responsible development, deployment, and adoption of AI technologies. The projects cover a range of critical themes, including Machine Unlearning, Synthetic Data Generation,  AI  Bias  Mitigation,  Ethical  AI  Frameworks,  Privacy-Enhancing  Tools, Explainable AI, AI Governance Testing, and Algorithm Auditing Tools. The details of the selected projects are given at Appendix II.

India is a founding member of the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI) and has contributed significantly to its vision of advancing Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy AI globally. India was elected as the Incoming Council Chair for 2023, Lead Chair for 2024, and Outgoing Chair  for  2025.  As  the  Incoming  Council  Chair,  India  hosted  the  Annual  GPAI  Summit  in December, 2023 which was a landmark event attended by 22000+ participants. As Lead Chair, India hosted the "Global India AI Summit' and midyear GPAI Summit in July 2024, in New Delhi where the 6th GPAI Ministerial Council was held and the event was attended by 12000+ participants.  Under  the  GPAI  New  Delhi  Declaration  2024,  GPAI  members  came  to  a consensus about the future of the GPAI and announced a renewed vision for GPAI through an integrated  partnership  with  OECD  bringing  together  all  current  OECD  members  &  GPAI countries on equal footing, under the GPAI brand.

The G20 New Delhi Leader's Declaration commits to pursue a pro-innovation regulatory/governance approach that maximizes the benefits and considers the risks associated with the use of AI. India is also a signatory to São Luís Declaration adopted in Brazil in 2024, which also highlights the need for global cooperation for AI governance and encourages G20 members to advance and reinforce interoperability between AI governance frameworks.

Further,  India  has  actively  participated  in  the  discussions  pertaining  to  a  United  Nations General Assembly (UNGA) resolution on AI for Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and co-sponsored that resolution.

India is a member of the Hiroshima AI Process Friends Group which involves a collaborative effort  by  member  countries  to  develop  a  Comprehensive  Policy  Framework  for  Artificial Intelligence that includes guiding principles and code of conduct aimed at promoting the safe, secure and trustworthy advanced AI systems.

India is also a signatory to the UN GDC adopted on September 22, 2024. Grounded in human rights  and  international  law,  the  GDC  includes  commitments  on  connectivity,  online  safety, and AI governance through the establishment of a multidisciplinary Independent International Scientific  Panel  on  AI  and  a  Global  Dialogue  on  AI  governance  in  the  margins  of  UN conferences and meetings.

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List of Data  &  AI  labs planned  by IndiaAI in collaboration with NIELIT in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities across the country:

|   S.No. | NIELIT Centre   | State/UT          |
|---------|-----------------|-------------------|
|       1 | Gorakhpur       | Uttar Pradesh     |
|       2 | Lucknow         | Uttar Pradesh     |
|       3 | Shimla          | Himachal Pradesh  |
|       4 | Aurangabad      | Maharashtra       |
|       5 | Patna           | Bihar             |
|       6 | Buxar           | Bihar             |
|       7 | Muzaffarpur     | Bihar             |
|       8 | Kurukshetra     | Haryana           |
|       9 | Ropar           | Punjab            |
|      10 | Haridwar        | Uttarakhand       |
|      11 | Bikaner         | Rajasthan         |
|      12 | Tezpur          | Assam             |
|      13 | Bhubaneswar     | Odisha            |
|      14 | Calicut         | Kerala            |
|      15 | Guwahati        | Assam             |
|      16 | Itanagar        | Arunachal Pradesh |
|      17 | Srinagar        | J&K               |
|      18 | Jammu           | J&K               |
|      19 | Ranchi          | Jharkhand         |
|      20 | Imphal          | Manipur           |
|      21 | Gangtok         | Sikkim            |
|      22 | Agartala        | Tripura           |
|      23 | Aizawl          | Mizoram           |
|      24 | Shillong        | Meghalaya         |
|      25 | Kohima          | Nagaland          |
|      26 | Leh             | Ladakh            |
|      27 | Silchar         | Assam             |

APPENDIX II

## The details of the selected projects under 'Safe & Trusted AI' Pillar are as under:

| NAME OF THE THEME                  | SELECTED APPLICANT                                                                | TITLE OF THE PROJECT                                                                                                                                                              |
|------------------------------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| Machine Unlearning                 | IIT Jodhpur                                                                       | Machine Unlearning in Generative Foundation Models                                                                                                                                |
| Synthetic Data Generation          | IIT Roorkee                                                                       | Design and Development of Method for Generating Synthetic Data for Mitigating Bias in Datasets; and Framework for Mitigating Bias in Machine Learning Pipeline for Responsible AI |
| AI Bias Mitigation Strategy        | National Institute of Technology Raipur                                           | Development of Responsible Artificial Intelligence for Bias Mitigation in Health Care Systems                                                                                     |
| Explainable AI Framework           | DIAT Pune and Mindgraph Technology Pvt. Ltd.                                      | Enabling Explainable and Privacy Preserving AI for Security                                                                                                                       |
| Privacy Enhancing Strategy         | IIT Delhi, IIIT Delhi, IIT Dharwad and Telecommunication Engineering Center (TEC) | Robust Privacy-Preserving Machine Learning Models                                                                                                                                 |
| AI Ethical Certification Framework | IIIT Delhi and Telecommunication Engineering Center (TEC)                         | Tools for assessing fairness of AI model                                                                                                                                          |
| AI Algorithm Auditing Tool         | Civic Data Labs                                                                   | ParakhAI - An open-source framework and toolkit for Participatory Algorithmic Auditing                                                                                            |
| AI Governance Testing Framework    | Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham and Telecommunication Engineering Center (TEC)         | Track-LLM, Transparency, Risk Assessment, Context & Knowledge for Large Language Models                                                                                           |

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