'India won't lag far behind in AI': Nandan Nilekani Stresses on Need for Heavy Lifting in Adoption
Infosys Chairman Nandan Nilekani offered a grounded take on the future of artificial intelligence (AI) adoption in India, stressing that the journey ahead demands more than enthusiasm it requires hard, systemic work. Addressing the ninth edition of the Global Technology Summit 2025, hosted by Carnegie India and the Ministry of External Affairs, Nilekani emphasized the ongoing intricacies of deploying AI in actual systems, especially in businesses and the public sector.
"AI does not mean that it's going to be less effort. It's going to be the same effort, if not more", Nilekani said, advising against the possibility of AI acting as a fix-it solution. He noted that actual integration would involve reworking workflows, redesigning operations, and building confidence in machine-made decisions an enormous step compared to past tech revolutions.
Nilekani pointed to a paradigm shift: "For the first time, we are going to put faith in non-human intelligence". He pointed out that previous technologies were deterministic and more explainable, whereas AI systems are probabilistic in nature making their errors more difficult to pardon and their reliability more challenging to guarantee.
Despite these challenges, Nilekani expressed optimism about India's ability to adopt AI swiftly. “Because of India’s situation today and the technological sophistication we’ve built over the last 15 years, the adoption gap between global innovation and India will be much smaller”, he said.
But he cautioned that AI uptake in the public sector would be the hardest because of rigidities in structure. "It's got ministries, it's got departments it's not an easy transition", he said, stressing that there is a need for coordinated and scalable approaches.
Answering India's lack of developing core AI models such as DeepSeek, Nilekani brushed aside such concerns, calling for emphasis on scaling efforts being made under the national AI mission instead of pursuing global comparisons.
The Global Technology Summit, to be held between April 10-12 in New Delhi, is an important platform for debate regarding cutting-edge technology, innovation, and digital aspirations of India in the face of a fast-changing world.
