Govt sets up task force on tapping AI for economic transformation

The government has set up a tax force comprising experts from various fields for recommending ways of utilising emerging technologies like artificial intelligence and other developments in the digital economy for India's economic transformation in the best possible ways.

Commerce and industry minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday announced the constitution of a Task Force on Artificial Intelligence (AI) for India's Economic Transformation.

The minister said that with rapid development in the fields of information technology and hardware, the world is about to witness a fourth industrial revolution. She said driven by the power of big data, high computing capacity, artificial intelligence and analytics, Industry 4.0 aims to digitise the manufacturing sector.

Sitharaman said the panel will comprise of experts, academics, researchers and industry leaders and will explore possibilities to leverage AI for development across various fields.

The task force will submit concrete and implementable recommendations for government, industry and research institutions.

The task force, headed by V Kamakoti of IIT Madras, will have Anuj Kapuria (High Tech RoboticSystemz Ltd), Anurag Agarwal (Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, CSIR), Ashish Dutta (IIT Kanpur), Ashwini Asokan (Mad Street Den, Chennai), Gautam Shroff (vice president and chief scientist, TCS Innovation Labs, Tata Consultancy Services, Gurgaon), G H Rao (HCL Technology), G Madhusudan (IIT Madras), G V N Apparao (ex-chief technology officer (CTO), Cognizant), Komal Sharma Talwar (founder, XLPAT), Kunal Nandwani (founder and CEO, uTrade Solutions), Shantanu Chaudhary (IIT Delhi, Department of Electrical Engineering), Vijay Kumar Sankarapu (founder and CEO, Arya.in), Ajay Kumar (additional secretary, ministry of Electronics & IT), Amandeep Gill (ambassador/PR to CD, Geneva), K Nagaraj Naidu (joint secretary (ITPO), Department of Economic Affairs, ministry of finance) and Aloke Mukherjee (DRDO) as members.

Ravinder (joint secretary, DIPP, ministry of commerce and industry), will be the convenor of the task force.

In addition to regular members, the commerce and industry ministry said it would seek participation from planning think-tank NITI Aayog, ministry of electronics and information technology, Department of Science and Technology, Unique Indentification Authority of India (UIDAI) and the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).