EXCLUSIVE: India will be 'significant pole' in universe of artificial intelligence, says Rajeev Chandrasekhar

India will be a "significant pole" in the universe of artificial intelligence (AI) going forward, said Rajeev Chandrasekhar, who is the Union Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology.

In an exclusive interview with Vikram Chandra for WION's 'The India Story' show, Chandrasekhar said that the "biggest use case that India AI will seek to develop an application for, is on governance, democracy 2.0, and that type of application that impacts the lives of Indian people".

Chandrasekhar, who is also the Union Minister of State for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, said that "we [India] have gone from being a nobody in 2014 to being today a country which has reasonable ambitions."

The minister spoke at length on the present and future of India's digital leadership journey and how the government is taking AI to the masses. He also talked about the policies being developed and implemented in the world of artificial intelligence.

"I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that India will be a significant pole in the universe of AI going forward. We are today, with India's AI policy, assembling what is going to be one of the world's highest quality and most diverse data sets programmes."

Referring to ChatGPT, which is an artificial intelligence chatbot developed by OpenAI, he said that he world is at a very early stage of AI. He said, "ChatGPT is not all things AI, and it is an indicator which tells the rest of the world that this is the potential power of AI, if harnessed right."

The minister said that bias is an important problem in AI, and ChatGPT proves that "occasionally."He noted that "one of the things that we are doing is to position our programme as one of the bias-free and diverse in the world."

"We are at the beginning of the race today, we are at the starting line, but certainly we will be in the leading pact in terms of shaping the future of AI, applications, and use cases of AI that will benefit the citizens," said Chandrasekhar as he talked of India's prospects despite the United States and China being leading leaders currently.

AI's impact on jobs

Experts and analysts have said that the recent launches of AI tools in the area of creative writing, learning techniques, etc will cause dramatic changes in the dynamics of jobs and employment.

Chandrasekhar explained that "if you look at the history of technology, what we have seen with the semiconductors and electronics, then with the internet, and with the AI - is that an idea takes shape, gets formed, and suddenly there's coming together of all the ingredients required to create a critical mass."

He said, "This is the case with big historical developments in the area of technology. An idea takes root, pieces of it come together, and there's a certain point in history when it becomes a force."

AI and ethical concerns

Chandrasekhar weighed in on the cons of AI as he said that regulation and guardrails are a must. He said, "I tend not to get swayed by or panicked by these doomsday scenarios of suddenly a computer becoming a human, super intelligence and all of that. I am of the view that human intelligence certainly, as the history of the world has shown, will keep pace with or will track ahead with the mission ahead."

He said, "If we wake up to the risks of a particular technology, for us to regulate it and create guardrails is not a difficult task. But it has to be recognised by the government of the world, the people of the world."

He suggested that the world should be ready to address both aspects of artificial intelligence and be prepared to mitigate the harm AI might do in the future.

He said that India is the chair of the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI), and one of the key agendas of GPAI under India's chair is to create ethical and risk-free AI.

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