WION World Pulse | 'AI is new geopolitical power': Nitin Pai on India’s strategy towards new technologies
&imwidth=600&imheight=450&format=webp&quality=medium "WION World Pulse | 'AI is new geopolitical power': Nitin Pai on India’s strategy towards new technologies")
Co-Founder and Director of the Takshashila Institution, Nitin Pai, at the WION World Pulse summit Photograph: (WION)
Nitin Pai, Co-Founder and Director of the Takshashila Institution, spoke at the Wion World Pulse summit. He discussed LLMs, a large number of servers and frontier models being developed in India.
Nitin Pai, Co-Founder and Director of the Takshashila Institution, said that technology, especially artificial intelligence, is emerging as a key pillar of geopolitical power, and India must actively participate in shaping its future. While speaking at at the WION World Pulse summit on Wednesday (Mar 18), Pai was asked about India’s position in the global AI landscape and whether the country is investing enough in the sector.
He said, "Tech is a form of geo-political power. Today is the era of geopolitics by tech, for tech and of tech. As per silicon valley mindset, India has no choice but to play the game and accumulate more power in terms of AI and Machine Learning: the only form of power in AI we can get when we have these LLMs & a large number of servers like computing powers and chips, as well as build frontier models."
However, Pai emphasised that India does not necessarily need to follow the same approach as Silicon Valley.
He said, "I don't think that's the only way of getting national power. We are trying to build models and attempting to get computing power by playing our game. But you don't need to have your own DeepSeek to play that game."
Our AI age will come from people: Nitin Pai
He was asked what would happen if AI companies like Deepseek or Claude AI were shut down by China or the US. Then where would India stand in terms of that decision?
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“That’s not true, and it is also not true that we are late,” he said. "A lot of things are happening in India in terms of AI. But yes, it doesn’t necessarily match what Silicon Valley leaders like Sam Altman expect. The Indian path is different. Our AI age will come from people. They will build systems like DeepSeek, Sarvam AI, and BharatGen."
Pai further highlighted that the real strength of India’s AI ecosystem will come from widespread adoption across sectors.
"The thrust of India’s power in AI will come when people adopt it in their daily work—whether doctors, lawyers, or other professionals. The next thing India will do is that Indian companies will help the world adopt AI," he added.
