Rajeev Chandrasekhar, minister of state for electronics and information technology, stated on Tuesday that the government will release a draft regulatory framework for artificial intelligence (AI) by June-July following thorough conversations with the sector.
Speaking at the Nasscom Technology and Leadership Forum (NTLF), although the minister discussed how legislation will put safeguards in place to make the technology safer, industry executives underlined that the technology will not result in job losses but may offer new possibilities.
Agreeing with the industry’s position, Chandrasekhar stated that the government supports implementing AI across use cases, from farm to factory, for economic growth, healthcare, agriculture, and farmer productivity. The aim is to build AI-skilled individuals, he explained.
Fei-Fei Li, inaugural Sequoia Professor in the Computer Science Department at Stanford University, who is also called as the Godmother of AI, said the technology is a tool to enhance our capabilities.
“The founding principle of AI is to augment and enhance humans and not to replace humans. We do need to take a historical view to inform the future. Humans have been making tools for thousands of years. And every time we make tools, our intention is to make us enhance our capabilities – whether it is a stone spear or a wheel or electricity or steel,” she said.
K Krithivasan, CEO and MD of Tata Consultancy Services, said that technologies like generative AI will not lead to manpower rationalisation. “Eventually we will be able to do more work. When you have more work, we need more people,” he said.
Krithivasan said that TCS will continue to hire the same number of people that it has been doing. “But probably there will be a change in what we are training and even the kind of people who we are hiring. But we don’t expect our headcount to come down,” he added.
The government’s decision to develop a regulatory framework was also applauded by industry leaders, who stated that it is necessary for developing a responsible AI environment.
“AI can literally be the guide, which is the whole purpose, but the flip side is that it can find out more information about you, it can enable intrusion of data privacy,” Ganesh Natrajan,” chairman, 5F World, a platform for digital start-ups, skills and social ventures, told Fe.
Natrajan said that every country, including the UK, Europe and the US, is looking at bringing in regulations for AI.
India’s AI market is growing at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 25-35% and is projected to reach $17-billion by 2027, a Nasscon-BCG report said. It added that this growth is fueled by multiple factors including increasing enterprise tech spending, India’s growing AI talent base and a significant increase in AI investments.
Globally, investments in AI have seen 24% CAGR since 2019, with 2023 seeing close to $83-billion investment, it said.
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