‘Deep understanding of AI’: Startup leaders decode PM Modi’s tech vision
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Leading voices from India’s artificial intelligence (AI) startup ecosystem shared their views and takeaways after meeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi, offering insights into his vision for innovation, societal transformation, and India’s expanding role in the global AI landscape.
Several founders and executives said the Prime Minister demonstrated a strong grasp of AI and its potential to address India-specific challenges while positioning the country as a global leader in the field.
‘PM has a deep understanding of AI’, say startup founders
Dr Pratyush Kumar, Co-founder of Sarvam AI, said Prime Minister Modi showed a deep understanding of AI technologies and their long-term impact. “His vision is clear—India should become a global leader in AI,” Kumar said. He added that the Prime Minister highlighted India’s linguistic diversity and noted that AI could act as a unifying force across multiple languages.
Nikhil Malhotra, Chief Innovation Officer at Tech Mahindra, who also attended the meeting, said the Prime Minister cited several unique and practical examples of AI adoption. “This reflects his deep understanding of the subject,” Malhotra said, adding that Modi stressed the importance of the widespread diffusion of AI across India.
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Focus beyond text-based models
According to startup founders, the Prime Minister’s thinking goes beyond text-based AI models to the broader role of artificial intelligence in science, innovation and real-world transformation. The emphasis, they said, was on ensuring that AI benefits reach the grassroots level.
“If India wants to become a ‘Vishwaguru’ in AI, the country needs to solve its own unique problems—problems that the rest of the world cannot solve. It is the responsibility of Indians to do this,” one of the founders said.
PM underlines startups as co-architects of India’s AI future
During the interaction, Prime Minister Modi underlined that startups and AI entrepreneurs are co-architects of India’s future. He encouraged the development of Indian AI models that promote indigenous content and regional languages.
Modi also stressed the importance of building ethical, unbiased and transparent AI systems grounded in strong data privacy principles. He assured entrepreneurs of full government support to ensure the success of Indian AI models.
Dr Siddharth Panwar, CEO at NeuroDx.AI, said the Prime Minister clearly understands India’s specific needs. “India should not replicate Western models but instead create its own solutions that resonate with Indians and address local challenges,” Panwar said.
Parth Sarathi, a research engineer at GAN.AI, said the Prime Minister’s leadership and vision played a key role in his decision to return to India from the United States. “We used to get many opportunities in the US, but now India also offers strong opportunities and funding to build AI models that can compete globally,” he said.
Startup leaders said the interaction reinforced confidence in India’s AI mission and highlighted the growing ecosystem that supports innovation, talent retention and globally competitive technology development.