India must invest in sovereign data infra, AI skilling for a new economy

NITI Aayog projects AI could add up to $1 trillion to India's GDP by 2035, but success depends on sovereign infrastructure, skilling, and responsible adoption

A new report by the NITI Aayog provides a road map for accelerated economic growth through the adoption of artificial intelligence (AI). It projects an additional contribution of $500-600 billion to gross domestic product by 2035 from productivity improvements alone, and of another $280-475 billion by leapfrogging innovation in research & development (R&D). India’s unique combination of a large tech-oriented workforce, an expanding digital infrastructure, and a growing R&D ecosystem gives it the potential to capture 10-15 per cent of the global AI value pool. But opportunity alone is not enough. A strong linkage among the government, industry and academia