India's big AI challenge: Let's get the basics right

As tech denial regimes stiffen, India's move to develop an indigenous AI chip is heartening. To join this race, we must catch up on fundamental enablers. Like education and risk capital

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It is welcome that India is gearing up to take on the challenge of artificial intelligence (AI). This technology is vital not just in its generative avatar, which has caught the public imagination ever since ChatGPT's 2022 debut, but also in multifarious forms that will fundamentally alter our notion of productivity. Economies that deploy AI across the board would undergo a step change in their global competitiveness. Unlike earlier advances in information technology, whose national origin did not materially affect the ability of people and companies anywhere to use them, AI is seen as an enabler of geopolitical power. Bars are in place, denying others access not just to its algorithms, but also other key secrets held within, some of which may help us understand latent biases and the propensity of these tools to hallucinate. Hardware is also being held close.