Digital India Act will deal with ill effects of AI: MoS Chandrasekhar

The aim of the Digital India Act (DIA) 2023 is to deal with the ill effects of artificial intelligence (AI) and it will succeed the current IT Act, Minister of State for Electronics and IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar said on Friday.

At present, the IT Act, which is about 22 years old, does not even mention the word internet, he said.

"To regulate AI as an ecosystem, the Digital India Act will have to be enacted which will deal with all the harms of AI," Chandrasekhar said while speaking at the 12th edition of Sadhguru Academy's (formerly Isha Leadership Academy) flagship program, INSIGHT: The DNA of Success kicked off on Thursday at Isha Yoga Center, here.

Founder of Isha Foundation the Sadhguru said I do not look at technology as a problem ever; it's a great possibility. But the nature of life is such, unless we rightly harness a possibility, it can become the worst problem in our lives.

Chandrasekhar sounded extremely optimistic while talking about 6G and wireless technology which, he said, could be a phenomenal shift in the way we do things and the way we deliver data and services to the world, and could catapult India into actively shaping the future of the internet alongside Japan, US, UK and Europe, a release said.

We have 845 million Indians today on the internet. We are the largest connected nation in the world on the internet. However, we also have 400 million Indians who are not on the internet," a release quoting the Minister said.

By 2026, it is expected that 1.2 billion Indians will be having direct, un-intermediated access to the internet, he noted.

Over 250 delegates are participating in the 12th edition of INSIGHT, being held from November 23-26 at the Isha Yoga Centre, Coimbatore.