RAISE 2020

• Global Virtual Summit on Artificial Intelligence (AI), RAISE 2020– ‘Responsible AI for Social Empowerment 2020’ is being organized by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) and NITI Aayog.
• It is a first of its-kind, global meeting of minds on Artificial Intelligence to drive India’s vision for social transformation through responsible AI.
• Key areas like Healthcare, Agriculture, Education and Smart Mobility amongst other sectors will be discussed.
• The event will start with a Startup Challenge – Pitchfest followed by the two-day summit, organized by the Government of India along with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology will witness robust participation from global industry leaders, key opinion makers, Government representatives and academia.

Why in News?

• PM Modi at RAISE 2020, a global AI summit, said that while there were very few things which were as empowering and easily accessible as AI, it was equally important that the technology be used responsibly.

What the PM said:

• Algorithm transparency and preventing its weaponization by non-state actors will be key factors in ensuring the trust for artificial intelligence (AI) increases among common people
• While there were very few things which were as empowering and easily accessible as AI, it was equally important that the technology be used responsibly.
• The Prime Minister stressed how the world’s largest unique identity system – Aadhaar along with the world’s most innovative digital payments system – UPI has enabled providing access to digital services, including financial services, like Direct Cash Transfers to the poor and marginalised.
• During the pandemic, it has enabled in reaching out to people with help, at the earliest and in the most efficient manner
• The Prime Minister said India has recently adopted the National Education Policy 2020, which focuses on technology-based learning and skilling as a major part of education. He added E-courses will also be developed in various regional languages and dialects.
• This whole effort will benefit from Natural Language Processing (NLP) capabilities of AI platforms. He said under the ‘Responsible AI for Youth’ program launched in April 2020, more than 11,000 students from schools completed the basic course.

Additional Details

What is AI?

• Artificial intelligence (AI) refers to the simulation of human intelligence in machines that are programmed to think like humans and mimic their actions. The term may also be applied to any machine that exhibits traits associated with a human mind such as learning and problem-solving.

What is Algorithm Transparency?

• Algorithmic transparency is the principle that the factors that influence the decisions made by algorithms should be visible, or transparent, to the people who use, regulate, and are affected by systems that employ those algorithms.
• But many of the algorithms that underlie our modern information ecosystem are not transparent and not neutral. They carry social values; some exhibit biases or systematically produce results that could lead to discrimination against certain people. Many users remain totally unaware that algorithms play a key role in their access to public information.

India’s quest for AI

1. National Strategy on Artificial Intelligence by NITI Aayog.
2. NewGen Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Centre (NewGen IEDC)–  seeks to promote knowledge-based and technology-driven start-ups by harnessing young minds and their innovation potential in an academic environment. This scheme will be applicable in domains such as AI, computer vision, IoT, FinTech, nanotechnology and much more.
3. Atal Incubation Centres (AIC) are headed by Atal Innovation Mission and were launched to nurture startups in India so that they can become scalable and sustainable business enterprises. This scheme is applicable to domains like AR/VR, IoT, AI, computer vision, nanotechnology and much more.
4. Assistance to Professional Bodies & Seminars/Symposia provides support in organising events for the scientific community which will help in enhancing the latest developments in their specific areas such as AI, AR/VR, computer vision, IoT, green energy, non-renewable energy.
5. In an attempt to achieve the goal of becoming a $5 Tn economy, the Indian government’s think-tank NITI Aayog recently released an approach paper to set up India’s first AI-specific cloud computing infrastructure called ‘AIRAWAT’ (AI Research, Analytics and Knowledge Assimilation platform). The platform aims to guide the research and development of new and emerging technologies.

Where are our competitors?

• China announced in 2017 its ambition to become the world leader in artificial intelligence (AI) by 2030.
• China’s approach to AI development and implementation is fast-paced and pragmatic, oriented towards finding applications which can help solve real-world problems.
• Its strategy is essentially three pronged – first of all being in step with all of AI’s diverse applications by 2020. Second, is to make inroads into cutting edge breakthroughs by 2025 which, in turn, would pave the way of it being the world leader in AI by 2030.

 Where India stands?

• Out of the 22,000 PhD educated researchers worldwide in Artificial Intelligence (AI), only 386 are in India.
• Moreover, serious research work in India in the field of AI is limited to less than 50 researchers with concentration mostly in institutes such as the IITs, IIITs and IISc. It is of critical importance that the government should increase financial allocation for sectors like AI to improve research ecosystem in the country.

Reference:

1. https://indianexpress.com/article/business/algorithm-transparency-key-to-establishing-trust-in-ai-tech-pm-modi-6704496/