Shivraj Singh Chouhan to launch AI-enabled Bharat VISTAAR on Tuesday

Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan will launch the ‘Bharat-VISTAAR’ from Jaipur on Tuesday, which is an AI-based platform to provide farmers with a single window of information on weather, market prices, pests and diseases, soil, crop advisories and government schemes through phone calls, chatbots and an app.

 

This facility will be launched in Hindi and English in Phase One across several states, including Maharashtra, Bihar and Gujarat.

 

Chouhan will also launch the ‘AI for Agriculture Roadmap’ and an ‘AI Hackathon’, an official statement said. The Bharat-VISTAAR project was announced in the FY27 Union Budget a few days back.

 

On this platform, farmers will be able to view information and status related to weather, market prices, pests and diseases, soil health, crop management and at least 10 major central government schemes. It will also integrate the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR)'s package of practices, crop management and soil health card-based soil advisories, providing farmers with scientific and region-specific advice.

 

It has been designed as a voice-first AI platform so that even farmers with simple feature phones can avail its benefits simply by calling.

 

The telephony helpline 155261 has been integrated into the platform, and features such as voice input-output, a website and mobile site chatbot are ready, and an Android app will also be released.

 

In the first phase, Bharat-VISTAAR will also integrate weather information from IMD, market prices from AgMarkNet, pest and disease management through the National Pest Surveillance System (NPSS), Agri-Stack data and information from 10 central government schemes. It will also integrate scheme details, application status, benefit tracking and grievance filing and resolution status, eliminating the need for farmers to repeatedly visit offices or various portals, the statement added.