Artificial Intelligence, AI: Advantage India for Viksit Bharat
By Prof PB Sharma and Sanskrit Sharma
As India moves forward into its accelerated trajectory of growth and sustainable development in the Amrit Kaal, one force stands poised to profoundly shape its destiny: Artificial Intelligence. AI presents a unique opportunity for India to leapfrog structural barriers, empower its massive population, and redefine the contours of its economy and society. However, realizing this potential is neither easy nor inevitable. It demands a sustained focus on the vision of Viksit Bharat@2047, continued thrust on robust, yet smart and intelligent infrastructure, proper ethical frameworks, and an inclusive mindset that cares for its people and the planet, the Mother Earth.
India Not a Passive Recipient of AI Revolution
Here it is important to recognize that India itself is not a passive recipient of this AI revolution. It is already demonstrating how AI can be adapted, scaled, and deployed in ways distinctly suited to its diverse socio-economic context. At its core, AI in India is not merely about automation or data processing. It is about enhancing human capabilities, bridging historical inequities, and unlocking new models of service delivery and productivity.
With a population exceeding 1.4 billion, the challenges that face a populous country are vast; healthcare access, education quality, resource distribution, employment generation, and providing good governance in an elected democracy framework. But here the catch lies in the scale of human resources India has, which when paired with AI, becomes a powerful advantage. In the opinion of the authors AI in India is, no less than a revolution in the making for translating AI as ‘Advantage India’.
India’s Talent Powerhouse of STEM lovers
It is heartening that India has succeeded in bridging the digital divide. Today with 97.6% urban and 96.8% rural mobile users in the age group of 15-29 years, powered by hyper connectivity and internet, India stands at the cusp of creating as well as encashing AI as Advantage India. The vast volumes of data generated by Indian users create a fertile ground for training robust machine learning models, that make AI grow stronger and versatile. Moreover, the country’s youthful demographic and thriving tech talent base, powered by its STEM lovers from school to university levels form a strong foundation for flourishing a new era of AI for meeting both the challenges of today as also to create future readiness for its vast talent powerhouse of young India that is capable of strengthening it’s indigenous AI ecosystem.
The Power of AI is Infinite
Already, we are witnessing how AI can function as an equalizer. In education, for instance, AI-driven platforms would allow for rural students to access personalized, adaptive learning experiences previously available only in elite urban institutions. In governance, AI may be used to create citizen centric policies and robust implementation systems free from human biases, address public grievances, predict urban planning needs, and deliver public services more efficiently. These would not just be simple incremental improvements; they signal a paradigm shift in how India governs and grows hereafter with AI translated as ‘Advantage India’.
AI Enables Dignified Inclusion
India’s vast diversity: linguistic, cultural and economic has long posed a challenge to inclusive development of all its peoples. But AI, especially in the domains of Natural Language Processing and speech recognition, is slowly but surely turning that diversity into a strength. Initiatives like Bhashini, the National Language Translation Mission, aim to ensure that every Indian, regardless of the language they speak, can access digital content, public services, and economic opportunities. AI enables not just inclusion, but dignified inclusion where access is not charity, but a right made possible through innovation.
In healthcare, AI can augment the reach of an overstretched system, allowing for accurate remote diagnostics, early detection of diseases, and AI-assisted treatment recommendations. This is crucial in a country where doctor-to-patient ratios are alarmingly low, particularly in rural regions. AI further can transform India’s rich tapestry of herbal and medicinal plants into scientifically curated natural medicines and provide an effective system to redefine healthcare as wellbeing and immunity from diseases.
Similarly, in agriculture AI-based predictive models and decision tools can reduce input costs, increase resilience against climate variability, and enhance profitability for smallholder farmers.
AI based Innovations are Commercially Viable and Socially Impactful
What emerges is a pattern: AI is not merely serving the rich and urban, if deployed wisely it can transform India into one of the healthiest, happiest and prosperous a country that ensures inclusivity and sustainability at all levels. Furthermore, the economic implications of AI adoption in India are staggering. According to industry estimates, AI could add upwards of $450–500 billion to India’s GDP by 2025, driven by productivity gains, improved decision-making, and new business models. Startups are already capitalizing on AI across sectors from fintech to logistics and healthcare to governance. India’s unique combination of digital public infrastructure (such as Aadhaar, UPI, DigiLocker) and open-source data models creates an enabling environment for AI-based innovation that is both commercially viable and socially impactful.
AI demands Responsibility and Accountability
But while the economic upside is enormous, it comes with very serious responsibilities. If unregulated, AI can accelerate job displacement, widen the gap between the digitally connected and the disconnected, and even entrench societal biases if algorithms are not trained on representative datasets. There is also the risk of surveillance overreach, especially if facial recognition and predictive policing tools are used without transparency and accountability.
To mitigate these threats, India must move decisively on several fronts: crafting a robust data protection law, establishing ethics guidelines for AI developers, investing in AI-focused education and research, and ensuring that public sector AI deployments are auditable and explainable.
AI is no Foreign Technology demamds Local Innovation
Unlike other hitech, AI is not a foreign technology to be imported and applied indiscriminately. For India to gain true advantage, it must develop an AI architecture that reflects its developmental priorities. This includes using AI to monitor environmental degradation, improve disaster preparedness, optimize energy usage, and enhance accessibility.
As such, india’s success will hinge not just on adoption, but on local innovation. We need to move beyond being a back-office for AI development and become a thought leader in AI governance, ethics, and applications. Therein lies the real opportunity not just for national advantage, but for global leadership.
India stands at a unique turning point. AI, if pursued with clarity, caution, and ambition, can become the cornerstone of India’s Second Independence; freedom from poverty, inequality, and institutional inefficiency. But if ignored or mismanaged, it can deepen divides and compromise democratic values.
Advantage India, therefore, is not just about AI capability, it’s about AI responsibility. It’s about training not just machines to learn, but citizens to understand and use responsively. It’s about ensuring that intelligence, artificial or otherwise, serves the collective good, not concentrated power.
As we look ahead, India must not ask whether it can lead in AI, rather it must make AI, in true sense ‘Advantage India’ and ask: how can AI help every Indian lead a better life?
The authors, Prof PB Sharma is an eminent academician, the Founder Vice Chancellor of DTU and past Presidents of AIU, currently Vice Chancellor of Amity University Gurugram. Sanskrit Sharma is an AI whiz and an 11-standard student of Amity International School.
