One thing is clear, the rising need for a soft law or finding a middle-path to regulating Artificial Intelligence (AI) is beyond AI itself. In India, all eyes are now on the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY). When MeitY amended its advisory on the use of AI and Generative AI technologies in March 2024, it shifted the onus of keeping it safe and above board on the companies using AI and the digital platforms. The rule requiring the government’s prior permission before deploying such technologies, mandated in December 2023, was removed.
And in early August, MeitY said that the government will legislate on AI if necessary, to ensure it does not cause harm. These are signs of a government trying to keep up and respond to a sector that is evolving rapidly and also promises to be a job creator. Clearly, the government does not want to shackle the sector that promises to create jobs, before it has taken off. At the same time, it needs to ensure it remains safe. For instance, according to a report by Nasscom on the ‘State of Data Science & AI Skills in India’, the demand for AI and data science professionals has risen from 4.20 lakh professionals (as of August 2022) to over one million in 2024.
Detailed and codified rules and regulations for use of AI technologies will be needed soon, with the additional challenge to ensure these do not become obsolete quickly. Any regulatory framework on AI will need to ensure ethical use, transparency, privacy protection, risk mitigation around bias (incorrect or misleading data), security and discrimination. To add to the complication, AI as a technology affects almost all sectors of the economy and even life, and therefore regulation may evolve from any of these areas.
India, at present, does not have a legislative framework to expressly regulate AI. While the government may include this in the much-awaited Digital India Bill which would replace the IT Act 2000, no one is sure how it will shape up. To its credit, the MeitY has been proactive as it expects the AI revolution in India to be bigger than the IT revolution and hopes to make India a global AI superpower. It has issued advisories and guidelines to promote responsible AI development. But are these enough to govern India’s growing digital landscape?
Considering the far-reaching impact AI is expected to have, urgent action will be key. There should be widespread consultation, not just with the industry but all segments of society, especially students, teachers, legal luminaries and consumer bodies, who will have little say on how AI will operate but will be affected by the developments all the same. That said, India has tried to be in step with the rest of the world. As the lead chair of the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI) for 2024, India hosted the GPAI Summit in December 2023. All 29 member-countries adopted the GPAI ‘declaration’ to work towards safe and trustworthy AI, prevent misinformation, unemployment, lack of transparency and fairness, and protection of intellectual property, among others.
Various steps taken
A few years back, various initial steps were taken in this domain, including the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) recommendations issued in July 2023 for responsible adoption of AI within the telecom sector. The Indian Council of Medical Research published guidelines, while the government also established the National Educational Technology Forum to facilitate the integration of technology, including AI, with teaching. In fact, the Reserve Bank of India and Bureau of Indian Standards are also working on framing rules and standards for AI and Machine Learning technologies.
Even as Indian authorities dabble with multiple ways to regulate the digital landscape, there seems to be no one-size-fits-all approach. Globally, countries have adopted varied approaches to AI regulation. The US has taken a balanced approach, with a focus on both innovation and safety, with the administration issuing executive orders to manage AI risks, protect privacy, and advance equity. On the other hand, the EU — with the introduction of the AI Act — has taken a more comprehensive approach to regulating AI. China’s AI regulations are stringent, which include ethics guidelines and data protection laws.
Back home, IndiaAI was MeitY’s umbrella programme to drive convergence across multiple national-level initiatives to catalyse the AI innovation ecosystem. The first edition of IndiaAI report, released in October 2023, states that AI is expected to add $967 billion to the Indian economy by 2035. As the government lays emphasis on skill-based training and facilitating learning to boost the digital landscape, a conducive regulatory framework is imperative to ensure orderly growth of the industry, where the AI-led tools are governed through checks and balances
The writer is a former Judge of the Allahabad High Court, and former Director (Additional Law Officer) with the Law Commission of India