NEW DELHI: India has emerged as a “shining beacon” among the Global South in AI, but the real challenge now is to move beyond pilot programs to credible deployment at scale, according to the “National AI Strategy and Implementation Guide” released by Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA). Based on work across India, Egypt, Indonesia, Bangladesh and the Philippines, the report finds that there is no single way to accelerate AI adoption. Instead, countries need a tightly coordinated ecosystem that includes computing, finance, skills, governance, and institutional accountability. India already has a structural advantage, said Saibal Chakraborty, who leads Boston Consulting Group’s technology and digital advantages practice in India.
“India has solved a large part of the problem of hard infrastructure and digital public infrastructure. Aadhaar, UPI and data centers make it easier to build AI applications at scale,” he said. Playbook cites IndiaAI facilitating over 38,000 GPUs, which were made available at less than Rs 60 per hour after central government negotiations with vendors. However, the report indicates a financing gap. While India has more than 120 unicorns, private capital largely avoids “socially sensitive sectors such as climate, education and rural solutions”. To address this issue, the playbook supports government-led fund models for public interest AI use cases. Regarding skills, Chakraborty said scaling AI requires the trust and oversight of senior leadership. Without CEO-level trust, AI risks remaining stuck in “cool pilots” despite strong national ambition.
