As we stand at the cusp of the AI revolution, the call for ethical, inclusive, and sovereign regulation of AI technologies has never been louder. In this moment of rapid transformation, Bharat finds itself uniquely positioned, not just as a technology consumer or enabler but as a potential shepherd of AI regulation across the Global South.
This potential was most visibly realised in the India AI Impact Summit 2026, the first major global AI gathering hosted by a Global South nation, held from 16 to 20 February 2026 at Bharat Mandapam, New Delhi. Organised under the IndiaAI Mission and the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology, the Summit brought together over 20 heads of state, Ministerial representatives from 118 countries, 100+ global AI leaders and CEOs, and more than 500,000 participants across five days of deliberations, exhibitions, and high-level dialogue.
What set the India AI Impact Summit apart was not simply its scale, but its thematic orientation. Unlike earlier multilateral AI gatherings that tended toward risk-centric debates, the Summit anchored discussions around impact, inclusion, and development outcomes. The narrative shift, from “AI safety” to “AI for people, planet, and progress” reflected India’s insistence that the AI discourse must be grounded in tangible societal and developmental priorities, especially those relevant to the Global South.
Under India’s Stewardship, three core principles guided the Summit’s architecture: (1) People: AI built for empowerment, inclusion, and dignity in education, health, and economic participation. (2) Planet: AI solutions that advance sustainability, climate resilience, and resource optimisation. (3) Progress: AI deployment that supports economic transformation, innovation ecosystems, and public-purpose outcomes.
This framing resonates directly with India’s constitutional ethos of justice, equality, and welfare and signals a decisive departure from frameworks primarily developed in high-income contexts with different social, political, and historical priorities.
This position was further articulated by our Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi, during the BRICS Summit Outreach Session, where he advanced the vision of “AI for All” and called for ‘Working Together For Responsible AI’. India's leadership during its G20 presidency in 2023 demonstrated a proactive and principled commitment to shaping the global discourse around AI. The New Delhi Leaders’ Declaration explicitly recognised the importance of “responsible AI development and deployment that respects human rights, transparency, explainability, and fairness.” This is not merely diplomatic language; rather, it is a reflection of India's philosophical and constitutional ethos of inclusive governance and its deep understanding of AI’s societal implications.
Why has it become so important?
The architecture of algorithms now shapes economies, influences democratic discourse, structures welfare delivery, and mediates access to opportunity itself. In this transformative moment, the contest is not merely technological but normative, but also about who writes the rules that will govern intelligence at scale?
For decades, regulatory paradigms have been exported from dominant technological powers to the rest of the world, often without regard for local realities, developmental asymmetries, or democratic vulnerabilities. Yet the Global South, home to the majority of humanity, cannot remain a passive recipient of standards crafted elsewhere. It must assert intellectual and regulatory agency. Bharat, with its unparalleled digital scale, constitutional commitment to justice and dignity, and rapidly maturing AI ecosystem, stands uniquely positioned to articulate a principled, development-orientated framework for responsible innovation.
Across the globe, countries are racing to establish regulatory frameworks for artificial intelligence, each charting a path shaped by distinct political values and strategic priorities. The European Union has emerged as a frontrunner with its EU AI Act, a landmark legislation that classifies AI systems by risk level and imposes stringent compliance obligations on high-risk applications, particularly in areas such as biometric surveillance, hiring, and education. In contrast, the United States has opted for a more laissez-faire approach, driven by executive orders and sector-specific guidance, prioritising innovation and global competitiveness over centralised ethical oversight that often leaves governance to internal corporate mechanisms.
Meanwhile, China has enacted algorithmic accountability laws for systems like content recommenders, not to ensure democratic transparency but to reinforce state control and ideological conformity. On the other hand, Brazil’s Artificial Intelligence Bill (PL 21/20) adopts a human rights-centred model, blending GDPR-style data protections with a clear focus on algorithmic accountability, offering a potentially replicable model for other nations in the Global South.
Despite such varied approaches, a significant number of developing countries remain peripheral to the global regulatory conversation, held back by limited technical expertise, institutional inertia, or a lack of political prioritisation. This is precisely where India can assert a leadership role, not as a hegemon but as a responsible and dignified voice championing inclusive, context-sensitive AI governance for peer nations, especially across Asia, Africa, and Latin America.
India’s Unique Digital Reality
India’s case is unique. We are a data-rich but privacy-poor nation. While our citizens generate enormous volumes of data daily, legal safeguards and algorithmic transparency mechanisms are still evolving. At the same time, we host the world’s largest biometric identity infrastructure (Aadhaar), boast widespread mobile internet penetration, and are building innovative digital public goods platforms like ONDC and CoWIN. These realities give India a nuanced understanding of both the transformative potential and the social risks of AI, especially in low-resource, high-diversity environments.
The Global South cannot afford to be passive importers of regulatory models crafted in Silicon Valley, Brussels, or Beijing. Instead, we must create homegrown, democratic frameworks rooted in local cultural values, governance structures, and economic conditions. Our core thesis is clear: In the absence of strong legal and ethical anchoring, AI will not only amplify existing inequalities but also pose severe threats to democratic accountability. Yet, if governed wisely, AI can become one of the most powerful tools of social and economic empowerment.
India’s opportunity, therefore, lies in transforming its complex domestic experience into a global voice for equitable AI governance, especially for those countries whose realities are more aligned with ours than with the industrial West. For instance, if we see the recent report by the Principal Scientific Advisor of Bharat, it highlights two key principles of trust and a people-centric approach to govern and develop AI models.
Towards a Global South AI Charter
A Global South AI Charter, spearheaded by India, could serve as a transformative framework for equitable and just AI governance, rooted in the lived realities of developing nations. At its core, this charter should prioritise data sovereignty, ensuring that digital public infrastructure is designed to serve citizens first before corporations or foreign interests. It must also emphasise ethical design and universal access, advocating for AI systems that are inclusive, language-agnostic, and tailored to the needs of diverse, often underserved populations.
A key pillar of this charter would be cross-border collaboration, enabling South-South partnerships to advance algorithm audits, AI literacy, and regulatory capacity-sharing. To ensure meaningful implementation, the framework must also establish robust accountability mechanisms, including local oversight bodies and participatory regulatory models that engage civil society, academia, and industry. By anchoring AI governance in these principles, such a charter could act as a vital bridge, connecting the technocratic standards of the Global North with the grassroots realities of the Global South and offering a genuinely alternative, inclusive model for the AI age.
For this, Bharat’s G20 narrative sends a powerful and principled message that technology must serve development, not surveillance; growth must be driven by openness and transparency, not exploitation. Rather than calling for a deterrence to innovation, Bharat advocates for a meaningful redirection, which aligns artificial intelligence with core human values, particularly in regions where the digital divide remains stark.
This vision is grounded in India’s own democratic experience. With a vibrant civil society, a robust constitutional framework, and a rapidly evolving ecosystem of digital public goods like DigiLocker, UPI, and IndiaStack, India stands out as a credible regulatory pioneer, one capable of integrating technological advancement with ethical governance. In an era where the unchecked power of Big Tech is eroding institutional trust worldwide, India offers a compelling alternative model where constitutional values meet code, and innovation is pursued with accountability, inclusivity, and integrity.
India today stands as one of the world’s largest digital societies, with over 850 million internet users, more than 1.2 billion Aadhaar-linked identities, and billions of digital transactions conducted every month through UPI. At such an unprecedented scale, even marginal design flaws acquire systemic consequences: a 1% architectural error can impact millions, an inaccessible interface can structurally exclude vulnerable communities, and a biased algorithmic model can entrench injustice within institutional decision-making. In a digital ecosystem of this magnitude, technological design is not merely technical, but it is constitutional in effect. This interestingly unfolds a dilemma that if an AI model works in India, it will work anywhere in the world. As PM Modi in his address at the AI Impact Summit, highlighted that, “India has diversity, demography, and democracy. Any AI model that succeeds in India can be deployed globally. Therefore, I invite all of you: Design and Develop in India. Deliver to the World. Deliver to Humanity. Once again, I extend my warmest wishes to all of you.”
Strategic Outcomes of the India AI Impact Summit 2026
Under today’s decisive leadership, the Cabinet-approved India AI Mission, with an outlay of ₹10,371.92 crore over five years, establishes a consolidated national AI backbone rather than fragmented pilot schemes. By treating compute, datasets, and foundational models as strategic public assets, it creates a shared national AI compute facility of over 10,000 high-performance GPUs accessible to startups, academia, and public institutions through structured partnerships.
This mirrors India’s DPI model, open, interoperable, and innovation-enabling while preventing monopolistic gatekeeping. Doctrinally, it democratises access to advanced compute; aligns AI development with public-purpose sectors such as agriculture, health, education, and climate resilience; and enables technological leapfrogging for the Global South. In doing so, Bharat offers an exportable democratic AI alternative between Silicon Valley’s corporate dominance and Chinese-style surveillance architectures.
Under the same budget outlay, the government planned the India AI Impact Summit of 2026. The Summit drew global endorsement for Bharat’s responsible and sovereign AI vision and showcased strong international confidence in the country’s technological capabilities, with infrastructure investment pledges crossing $250 billion and around $20 billion in deep-tech commitments.
Bharat’s role in shaping the future AI landscape was highlighted, including the quality of indigenous AI models and unprecedented youth involvement, notably over 2.5 lakh students contributing to discussions on ethical AI, earning a Guinness World Record. Framed within the broader vision of “Viksit Bharat 2047”, the Summit was described as a landmark step toward building long-term technological and semiconductor capacity in India’s AI ecosystem.
The result of it was that Bharat unveiled several sovereign AI models, reflecting its push for indigenous, multilingual, and open AI infrastructure. Key releases included Sarvam 30B and Sarvam 105B by Sarvam AI, large language models tailored for Indian languages and enterprise use; BharatGen Param2, a 17B-parameter government-backed multilingual foundational model; and Vachana, a text-to-speech model by Gnani.ai supporting multiple Indian languages. Additionally, MANAS 1, a neurological AI system for early brain disorder detection, and the AI-enabled education platform SATHEE developed by IIT Kanpur were highlighted, marking a significant step toward Bharat’s sovereign AI ecosystem.
Under the Same AI Impact Summit, it has unfolded its first attempt to lead this Global AI Charter, starting with the AI Impact Summit Declaration, New Delhi, under the principle of सर्वजन हिताय, सर्वजन सुखाय” (Welfare for all, Happiness of all). This declaration was endorsed by 91 countries and international organisations, with a commitment to advance shared priorities to promote AI for ensuring a prosperous future for humanity.
Regulation as Normative Statecraft, Not Innovation Deterrence
The AI revolution is unfolding at an unprecedented pace, leaving no room for delay. But India does not scramble to catch up; it has already chosen to lead on its own terms, which is reflected in the words of our Prime Minister as he remarked that “AI should be aimed at fostering progress and well-being of all” at the Outreach Session on Artificial Intelligence, Energy, Africa and the Mediterranean at the G7 Summit. Thereby, rather than imitating the regulatory models of the West or China, Bharat should champion a distinctive approach to AI stewardship, one that embodies the aspirations, values, and lived experiences of the Global South.
India is not entering the AI era as a follower; it brings three structural strengths that position it as a consequential architect of the global AI order. First is scale with diversity – designing for one of the world’s most heterogeneous populations across languages, incomes, abilities, and cultures. Systems that function reliably in India’s complexity possess inherent global adaptability. Second is frugal innovation – Bhartiya designers have long delivered high-impact solutions under resource constraints, an approach that is indispensable as the world seeks sustainable and inclusive AI architectures. Third is civilisational depth – Bharat's philosophical traditions place the human being, not the machine, at the centre of meaning, agency, and responsibility, offering a normative foundation for genuinely human-centric AI.
Complemented by capacity-building initiatives such as the India AI Mission and the India Semiconductor Mission, the country is simultaneously strengthening its technical backbone. These initiatives ensure that policy discourse remains anchored in technological realism, catalysing rigorous engagement among young innovators who increasingly see technology not as a threat to be resisted, but as an instrument for measurable public value.
As I have also argued in our book ‘AI on Trial’, regulation is not a barrier to innovation; rather, it is the steering wheel that ensures progress stays on a just and ethical course. For too long, the Global South has been treated as a passive consumer of AI technologies. Now, it must rise as a normative force, shaping the future of AI governance on its own terms. With its moral authority, democratic foundations, and rapidly expanding technological infrastructure, India has both the responsibility and the opportunity to lead this transformation as a voice for fairness, inclusivity, and global equity in the age of artificial intelligence.
In conclusion, India stands at a rare historical inflexion point where scale, democratic legitimacy, technological capacity, and civilisational wisdom converge. The question is no longer whether AI will reshape societies, but who will shape the norms that govern AI. For the Global South, the stakes are existential: regulatory passivity risks digital dependency, extractive data regimes, and algorithmic inequities that entrench structural disadvantages for generations. India’s experience in building inclusive digital public infrastructure, its constitutional commitment to justice and dignity, and its expanding sovereign AI capabilities position it to articulate a third pathway, distinct from both unrestrained market fundamentalism and state-centric techno-authoritarianism.
By championing a Global South AI Charter grounded in data sovereignty, accountable innovation, multilingual inclusion, and capacity-sharing, India can transform regulatory discourse into a developmental instrument. Leadership in this domain is not merely diplomatic symbolism; it is normative statecraft. If guided by prudence, institutional rigour, and ethical clarity, India can ensure that AI evolves not as a force of domination or dependency, but as an architecture of empowerment, equity, and shared global progress.
Md. Tauseef Alam
(The content of this article reflects the views of writer and contributor, not necessarily those of the publisher and editor. All disputes are subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of competent courts and forums in Delhi/New Delhi only)
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