IndiaAI Mission Is No Substitute for a National AI Strategy

The IndiaAI Mission lacks the mandate and political heft to drive whole-of-government coordination or signal the long-term political commitment required to align public and private action

Published in the Indian Express

India today stands at a pivotal moment in the global race for artificial intelligence. As the United States and China drive a new era of AI competition, and the European Union asserts leadership on AI regulation, India has articulated its ambition to lead - not only in technology but in shaping an inclusive and democratic model of global AI governance. With its democratic legitimacy and digital capacity, India is uniquely positioned to represent the Global South in AI forums.

But ambition alone is not enough. Without a comprehensive, politically grounded national strategy, India risks falling behind - both in technological capability and in its ability to manage the strategic and social transformations that AI will demand. The choice is clear: India can remain a passive adopter of AI technologies designed elsewhere or take deliberate steps to shape its own - and the global - AI future.

The IndiaAI Mission, approved last year with a budget of over ₹10,000 crore, is a welcome step. But it is a mission without a mandate or democratic legitimacy. The IndiaAI Mission, housed as a division of a Section 8 company under MeitY is led by a bureaucrat with additional charge. Operating without Cabinet-endorsed national strategy, it lacks both the mandate and political heft to drive whole-of-government coordination or signal the long-term political commitment required to align public and private action.

In fact, India is an outlier among AI majors. The United States, China, the United Kingdom, and the EU all anchor their AI efforts in formal, Cabinet-endorsed national strategies with clear roadmaps and timelines.

This governance gap is critical because India faces structural deficits that impede its AI ecosystem - deficits that cannot be overcome through incremental approaches. The Indian R&D base remains relatively shallow. Our universities remain underrepresented in global AI rankings; the pipeline of AI-specialised PhDs is limited; collaboration between academia and industry is weak. India continues to lose top-tier AI talent to global hubs.

In the private sector, gaps persist. India’s IT industry remains oriented toward services. Research investments by the industry are modest relative to international companies, and to the extent that the Indian IT industry has engaged with AI, it has been largely in deployment - downstream of frontier AI innovation. Consequently, India lacks AI-first national champions and the deep-tech industrial ecosystem seen in global leaders. Venture capital majors are frank: they see India as a consumer market, not a deep-tech innovator. Funding remains skewed towards consumer-tech, not foundational research. In defense and infrastructure, AI integration remains nascent.

Bridging these deficits will require a coordinated transformation - guided by a national strategy, anchored in political consensus, and designed to provide long-term policy stability. That consensus is precisely what India’s current approach lacks. Parliament’s role goes beyond regulation; it is the primary forum for signalling bipartisan political consensus that will sustain policy across electoral cycles.

Yet Parliament has remained extraneous to shaping national AI governance. Engagement has been limited and diffident with less than 1% of questions on AI. There is too no dedicated institutional mechanism for AI, despite its complexity and pervasive impact. In other leading democracies, legislative processes have built bipartisan support for AI strategies, ensured transparency, and aligned governance with public values. Without parliamentary anchoring, India’s AI governance risks remaining fragmented and vulnerable to administrative shifts.

The consequences of this democratic deficit are already evident. Important debates around strategic autonomy, use of public data, energy demands, and national security implications have received short shrift in the largely technocratic policy discussions to date. This absence also undermines India’s international credibility. While India’s leadership of the Global Partnership on AI signals global ambition, without a coherent domestic strategy and institutional architecture, that leadership will be difficult to sustain. Other democracies will rightly look to whether India’s governance at home aligns with its aspirations abroad.

The path forward is clear. India needs a Cabinet-endorsed National AI Strategy - presented to Parliament - that sets out a vision, an actionable roadmap, and mechanisms for democratic accountability. This strategy must establish an empowered coordinating authority with a whole-of-government mandate; align R&D, industrial policy, and security strategy; and create frameworks for public engagement and parliamentary oversight.

Most importantly, it must be grounded in political consensus. AI is not just another technology. It is a general-purpose transformation that will reshape national security, economic structures, and the social contract itself. Managing that transformation requires policy stability and legitimacy - built through broad-based national deliberation.

India’s strengths are undeniable: a young population, a competitive digital economy, and the world’s largest democracy. These assets position India to chart an AI trajectory that combines innovation with inclusion. But that future will not emerge by default. It must be built — through deliberate strategy, institutional reform, and democratically grounded governance.

The window for action is closing. As global AI governance frameworks take shape and capabilities advance rapidly, India must move beyond piecemeal initiatives toward a comprehensive strategy. AI governance is too consequential to be left to fragmented administrative processes. It must be treated as a national strategic priority - grounded in democratic consensus - if India is to shape an AI future aligned with its national interests and global leadership aspirations.

This column is based on the Foundation's Report: Governing AI in India: Why Strategy Must Precede Mission. The complete report is available for download here: https://tinyurl.com/FutureofIndiaAI.

A small note: I’ve been considering moving more of my writing to this blog. While newspaper op-eds offer wide reach, they also come with constraints - the need for a news peg, word limits, and delays between writing and publication. Writing here allows greater flexibility in form, timing, and tone.

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