NITI Aayog and Google to help grow AI ecosystem

NITI Aayog and Google have come together to work on a range of initiatives to help build the AI (artificial intelligence) ecosystem across the country.

NITI Aayog has been entrusted to setup a national programme to conduct research and development in frontier technologies such as AI.

Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. AI is a key enabler for solving problems for its users, customers and society. Google has also made available a set of educational resources about machine learning and AI, including a free online machine learning crash course that anyone can use to learn and practice machine learning concepts.

Google and NITI Aayog will work on the following initiatives: Organise training for relevant government functionaries to introduce them to open source AI tools with the goal of enabling more effective governance; Awarding grants and scholarships to researchers, scholars and university faculty in the field of AI/ML in India; Organising AI/ML study jams for students and developers; Incubating Indian AI/ML startups; and Organise a hackathon focused on using AI/ML and open data sets to solve key challenges within agriculture, education, healthcare, etc. in India.

Commenting on the association, Amitabh Kant, CEO, NITI Aayog said, “India is embracing future technologies such as machine learning and AI to augment its capacity in healthcare, improve outcomes in education, develop innovative governance systems for our citizens and improve overall economic productivity of the nation. NITI’s partnership with Google will unlock massive training initiatives, support startups and encourage AI research through PhD scholarships, all of which contributes to the larger idea of a technologically-empowered New India.”

Rajan Anandan, Vice President, India and South East Asia said, “Artificial intelligence has the potential to improve people’s lives in profound ways — from helping diagnose diseases and breaking down language barriers to making businesses more efficient. And we’re just at the beginning of what’s possible.”