NEW DELHI (AP) — Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday pitched his country as a central player in the global artificial intelligence ecosystem, saying it aims to build technology domestically and deploy it globally.
“Design and develop in India. Deliver to the world. Deliver to humanity,” Modi told a gathering of some world leaders, technology executives and policymakers at the India AI Impact Summit in New Delhi.
Modi’s comments came at a time when India – one of the fastest growing digital markets – is looking to leverage its experience in building large-scale digital public infrastructure and present itself as a cost-effective hub for AI innovation.
The summit was also addressed by French President Emmanuel Macron, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and UN Secretary General António Guterres, who called for a $3 billion fund to help poorer countries build fundamental AI capacity, including skills, data access and affordable computing power.
“The future of AI cannot be determined by a handful of countries, or left to the whims of a few billionaires,” Guterres said, emphasizing that AI “must belong to everyone.”
India wants to increase its AI scale
India is using the summit to position itself as a bridge between advanced economies and the South. Indian officials cite the country’s digital ID and online payment systems as models for deploying AI at low costs, especially in developing countries.
“We must democratize AI. It must become a tool for inclusion and empowerment, especially for the Global South,” Modi said.
He later separately met with technology leaders, many of whom outlined their investment plans in India and agreed to commit to a broad set of principles for developing ‘inclusive and multilingual’ AI.
Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, said the company will work with India’s Tata Group on AI initiatives, including the development of data center infrastructure in the country.
“We believe that the democratization of AI is the only fair and safe path forward,” Altman said at the meeting. A group photo featuring Modi, Altman and a dozen other technology leaders went viral when Modi invited everyone to hold and raise their hands together. Altman and Dario Amodei, the CEO of AI company Anthropic, broke the chain by not holding hands. fierce rivalry with OpenAI. Altman later said he was confused about what happened.
With nearly 1 billion internet users, India has become a key market for global technology companies expanding their AI activities.
Microsoft announced last December an investment of $17.5 billion in four years to expand cloud and AI infrastructure in India. It followed Google’s $15 billion investment in five years, including plans for the country’s first AI hub. Amazon has also committed $35 billion by 2030, focused on AI-driven digitalization.
India is also looking for $200 billion in data center investments in the coming years.
However, the country is lagging behind in developing its own large-scale AI model US-based OpenAI or China’s DeepSeekhighlighting challenges such as limited access to advanced semiconductor chips, data centers and hundreds of local languages to learn from.
The summit has faced problems
The summit started with organizational problems on Monday, as visitors and exhibitors reported long lines and delays, and some on social media complained that personal belongings and exhibition items had been stolen. Organizers later said the items had been recovered.
The problems surfaced again on Wednesday when a private Indian university was expelled from the top after an employee showcased a commercially available Chinese-made robot dog and claimed it as the institute’s own innovation.
The setbacks continued Thursday when Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates pulled out of a planned keynote address. No reason was given, although the Gates Foundation said the move was intended “to ensure the focus remains on the AI Summit’s key priorities.”
Gates is facing questions about his ties to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
