A glimpse of the long queues and bustling corridors at the IndiaAI Impact Summit venue – New Delhi’s Bharat Mandapam is enough to show how democratized the generative AI boom has become. While a large part of this phenomenon is being built on journalism, big tech companies continue to undermine the economics of news publishing, experts warned at the summit.
At the India AI Summit, several news publishers participated in a conversation on AI and the synergy needed between newsrooms.The news business — both legacy companies and upstarts — is facing a structural shock that has become starkly visible over the past year: Major AI platforms are shifting their core product functions to training models and influencing user traffic, without sharing all the value.
“60% of searches are no longer going to websites as a result of AI summaries in search. How are we funding journalism? There has been a massive decline in the last 12 months,” said Robert Whitehead, Digital Platform Initiatives Lead at the International News Media Association. He was speaking on the opening day of the IndiaAI Impact Summit 2026, where leaders from the Digital News Publishers Association asserted that AI platforms were extracting value from publishers without fair compensation.
“It’s already depriving businesses of revenue that are funding the accuracy of data required for a sovereign model or any other major language model,” Whitehead said.
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Tech Giants vs. News Agencies: The Way ForwardDigital news publishers’ business models depend significantly on traffic from search and social platforms. In the panel titled ‘AI and Media: Opportunities, Responsible Paths, and the Road Ahead’, speakers said the rise of AI-generated answers and summaries is accelerating the “zero-click” trend, where users get information without visiting source sites.
At the same time, AI models rely heavily on news publishers for training and output, often without revenue sharing or attribution. Experts say there is a growing imbalance in how AI platforms are capturing audience and value, while newsrooms bear the cost of producing reliable information.
Kali Puri, vice chairperson and executive editor-in-chief of India Today Group, said, “I think we don’t get the same exception from tech companies as American media brands and I see that as digital imperialism.”
AI models require high-quality, verified text, much of which comes from newsrooms that fund original reporting. “We’re the guys who are funding the reporters to go out and break the original story… We’re not getting credit for it. We’re not getting any money for it,” he added.
Global analytics firms and publishers report sharp declines in referral traffic from search, even as AI overviews and answer boxes expand their presence. Industry-wide estimates cited by media executives indicate that there are 20-60% fewer click-throughs for news-related queries.
“In a while, how will we sustain journalists,” Puri asked. “If we don’t have real stories, AI will eat AI… It will continue to create stories out of artificial stuff.”
How should AI treat news?The panelists also discussed how journalism should be treated differently from other types of content in AI systems. News carries far more consequences for measuring engagement and can affect elections, markets, social stability and national security, they said.
“Journalistic content is not like free-floating content on the Internet. It is something that is intellectual property. It is created with investment, infrastructure, talent,” said Mohit Jain, Chief Operating Officer and Executive Director, Bennett Coleman & Company Limited.
He argued that when AI tools summarize or redistribute news, they influence public discourse in ways comparable to publishers. “Anything that begins to participate in a democratic process deserves a different standard of care.”
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Watch: Full session on AI and media from India AI Summit at Bharat Mandapam, New Delhi
India pitches to host AI infraThe Indian government has highlighted the IndiaAI Impact Summit as a global opportunity to build AI governance and geopolitical consensus. This is being organized for the first time in a developing country.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, “The theme of the summit is… to use artificial intelligence for welfare, happiness for all, human-centric progress.” reflects our shared commitment to.” Keynote speakers include Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, Reliance Chairman Mukesh Ambani, and Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis.
Also read: Over 600 Startups, 70,000 Sqm Area, 2.5 Lakh Visitors – Mega Scale of Global AI Summit in Delhi
In a panel discussion on Monday, Sujata Gupta, Secretary General, DNPA, highlighted the significance of journalism in the AI era. As India builds its AI capabilities, accountability, attribution and institutional trust must remain fundamental, he said.
Beyond revenue and business implications, panelists emphasized that models built primarily on foreign-language datasets often underperform in Indian languages and fail to capture regional importance. “Tier-2 and Tier-3 India form the backbone of the country’s demographic strength, and AI systems must reflect the linguistic diversity and cultural context,” said Pawan Aggarwal, Deputy Managing Director, Dainik Bhaskar Group.
“If not protected now… you will only see user generated news and no newsroom,” he added. “There will be no one to take responsibility.”
Others argued that the ultimate impact would be on citizens’ information ecosystems. “The biggest loss will be the customers. You can’t keep me in an information bubble all the time,” said Tanmoy Maheshwari, managing director of Amar Ujala Group.
Big tech companies generally reject claims that AI is undermining journalism. They say their platforms send billions of clicks annually to news sites, and that AI summaries often promote rather than replace publisher content.
Also read: IT, BPO services will disappear within five years, says tech billionaire Vinod Khosla
International developments have formed a significant part of the discussion, including the European Union’s AI Act, which introduces labeling obligations for AI-generated content; steps by France and Germany to implement the rights framework necessary for technology platforms to negotiate compensation agreements with publishers; and Australia’s News Media Bargaining Code, which mandates commercial negotiations between platforms and publishers and has led to substantial remuneration agreements.
The discussion also addressed the opportunities arising from the AI revolution. Experts highlighted how AI could deepen archives, enhance relevant journalism, improve newsroom efficiency and strengthen subscription models. “The challenge is to ensure long-term credibility rather than AI destroying it,” said Navneet LV, CEO of The Hindu Group.
