Safe and Trusted AI Ecosystem in India

• 14 Oct 2025

Source: PIB 

Why in News? 

The Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY), under its IndiaAI Mission, has selected five pioneering projects under the Safe & Trusted AI pillar, targeting deepfake detection, bias mitigation, and security evaluation. 

• IndiaAI, an Independent Business Division under MeitY, is the implementation agency for the IndiaAI Mission. It aims to democratize AI benefits across all strata of society, and ensure the ethical and responsible use of AI. 

What are the Key Projects under IndiaAI’s Safe & Trusted AI Pillar? 

• Deepfake Detection: 
  • Saakshya (IIT Jodhpur & IIT Madras): Real-time multi-agent framework using retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) to detect and govern deepfakes, protecting against misinformation and digital fraud. 
  • AI Vishleshak (IIT Mandi): Enhanced audio-visual deepfake and handwritten signature forgery detection with adversarial robustness and explainability, aiding forensic accuracy. 
  • Real-Time Voice Deepfake Detection (IIT Kharagpur): Tools to detect synthetic voice manipulations, securing communication channels and preventing identity fraud. 
• Bias Mitigation: 
  • Evaluating Gender Bias in Agricultural LLMs (Digital Futures Lab & Karya): Benchmarks and mitigates gender bias in AI models for agriculture, fostering fair and inclusive AI applications benefiting women farmers and rural communities. 
• Penetration Testing and Evaluation: 
  • Anvil (IIIT Dharwad): A penetration testing and evaluation tool for LLMs and generative AI, enhancing AI system security and resilience against adversarial attacks. 

How is the IndiaAI Mission Fostering a Responsible AI ecosystem in India? 

The seven pillars of the IndiaAI Mission aim to ensure responsible and safe AI deployment in India.  

• IndiaAI Compute Pillar : This pillar provides high-end GPUs at affordable costs.  
  • These GPUs are available at a subsidized rate of just ₹65 per hour. 
• IndiaAI Application Development Initiative : This pillar develops AI applications for India-specific challenges.  
  • Sectors include healthcare, agriculture, climate change, governance, and assistive learning technologies.  
• AIKosh (Dataset Platform) : AIKosh develops large datasets for training AI models. It integrates data from government and non-government sources.  
• IndiaAI Foundation Models : This pillar develops India’s own Large Multimodal Models using Indian data and languages.  
  • It ensures sovereign capability and global competitiveness in generative AI.  
• IndiaAI FutureSkills : This pillar builds AI-skilled professionals.  
• IndiaAI Startup Financing : This pillar provides financial support to AI startups.  
  • The IndiaAI Startups Global program launched in March 2025.  
• Safe and Trusted AI : This pillar ensures responsible AI adoption with strong governance.  
  • Focus areas: machine unlearning, bias mitigation, privacy-preserving ML, explainability, auditing, governance testing.

AI Ecosystem in India  

• Tech Sector Growth: Annual revenues projected to cross USD 280 billion in 2025. 
• Employment: Over 6 million professionals are employed in the tech and AI ecosystem. 
• Global Capability Centres (GCCs): India hosts 1,800+ GCCs, with 500+ focused on AI. 
• Startup Landscape: Approximately 1.8 lakh startups in India; 89% of new startups last year incorporated AI into products/services. 
• AI Adoption: On the NASSCOM AI Adoption Index, India scores 2.45/4, with 87% of enterprises actively using AI solutions. 
• Leading Sectors: Key adopters include industrial & automotive, consumer goods & retail, BFSI, and healthcare, contributing around 60% of AI’s total value. 
• AI Maturity: About 26% of Indian companies have achieved AI maturity at scale (BCG survey). 

Click here to Read: India’s AI Revolution

Drishti Mains Question: 

Discuss the role of IndiaAI in ensuring responsible AI deployment, mitigating biases, and safeguarding citizen rights in India’s AI ecosystem.

  

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Q1.What is the objective of IndiaAI’s Safe & Trusted AI Mission? 
IndiaAI aims to strengthen safe, trusted, and ethical AI, promoting responsible deployment, inclusive governance, and technological self-reliance across India.

Q2.Which key projects have been selected under IndiaAI’s Safe & Trusted AI pillar? 
Five projects include Saakshya, AI Vishleshak, Real-Time Voice Deepfake Detection, Evaluating Gender Bias in Agricultural LLMs, and Anvil.

Q3.What is the current status of AI adoption and ecosystem in India? 
India has a USD 280 billion tech sector, employs over 6 million professionals, hosts 1,800+ GCCs, and sees 87% of enterprises actively using AI, with 26% achieving AI maturity at scale.

UPSC Civil Services Examination Previous Year Question (PYQ)  

Prelims:

Q. With the present state of development, Artificial Intelligence can effectively do which of the following? (2020)

1. Bring down electricity consumption in industrial units 
2. Create meaningful short stories and songs 
3. Disease diagnosis 
4. Text-to-Speech Conversion 
5. Wireless transmission of electrical energy 

Select the correct answer using the code given below:  

(a) 1, 2, 3 and 5 only   

(b) 1, 3 and 4 only  

(c) 2, 4 and 5 only   

(d) 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5  

Ans: (b)

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Mains:

Q. Introduce the concept of Artificial Intelligence (AI). How does Al help clinical diagnosis? Do you perceive any threat to privacy of the individual in the use of AI in healthcare? (2023)