Why Amitabh Kant says India doesn't need to win the AI Race

Amitabh Kant, former G20 Sherpa and NITI Aayog CEO, argues India does not need to win the AI race by building the world's largest large language model but should instead focus on using artificial intelligence to transform healthcare, education, manufacturing and urbanisation while building a greener economy. "The AI race has just begun. The race is never won by the first mover," Kant said, emphasizing that India should become the country that uses AI better than anyone else and leverage its strengths in AI talent, data, policy and renewable-energy-powered data centres.

Why Amitabh Kant says India doesn't need to win the AI Race Everyone wants to build the next ChatGPT. Amitabh Kant thinks India should aim higher. The former G20 Sherpa and NITI Aayog CEO doesn't believe India's future depends on producing the world's biggest large language model. Instead, he argues the country should focus on something far more ambitious: using artificial intelligence to transform healthcare, education, manufacturing and urbanisation while building a greener, more sustainable economy. "The AI race has just begun. The race is never won by the first mover," Kant said during a fireside conversation at OPEN Green Shift, arguing that history is full of companies that entered late but ultimately changed the game. For Kant, the real question isn't whether India builds the next frontier AI model. It's whether India can become the country that uses AI better than anyone else. Greening the Future 23 Jul 2026 - Vol 05 | Issue 30 Securing a sustainable India Read Now Greening the Future /magazine/greening-the-future Kant argues that India is entering a once-in-a-century phase of transformation. Over the next three decades, another 500 million Indians will move to cities, creating an opportunity to build nearly 500 new urban centres from the ground up. Unlike many Western economies, India still has the chance to avoid decades of unsustainable development. His message is simple: don't repeat the mistakes of the West. Instead of building cities around cars, India should build cities around people—with clean public transport, cycling, walkability, renewable energy, water recycling and circular waste systems. Technology, he said, should help India leapfrog older models of development rather than imitate them. Kant doesn't believe India has to dominate every layer of the AI ecosystem. The global AI supply chain is already deeply interconnected, from chips and computing power to specialised manufacturing. Rather than trying to lead everywhere, India should become indispensable where it has natural strengths. Those strengths, he said, include one of the world's fastest-growing pools of AI talent, abundant data from a rapidly digitising economy, progressive public policy and renewable-energy-powered data centres. "You can't be a champion of everything. You have to be a champion of some nodes," he said. He also pushed back against fears that AI will destroy jobs, arguing that every major technological revolution has ultimately created new industries and new kinds of work. The bigger challenge, he said, is preparing India's workforce by introducing AI education much earlier in schools and colleges. For Kant, sustainability is no longer an environmental slogan. It is an economic and strategic necessity. India imports the overwhelming majority of its fossil fuels, making renewable energy, electric mobility and green hydrogen essential not just for climate goals but for long-term energy security. He believes the country has the natural advantages to become a global leader in clean energy, green hydrogen and sustainable manufacturing. Kant argued that transformative innovation rarely comes from established incumbents. Instead, younger companies are the ones pushing breakthroughs in electric mobility, battery storage, green hydrogen, space technology and other emerging sectors. India, he said, must continue encouraging this culture of innovation if it wants to stay ahead. In the end, Kant's message wasn't really about artificial intelligence. It was about imagination. AI will matter. Green hydrogen will matter. Renewable energy, startups and sustainable cities will all matter. But India's biggest competitive advantage may be that it is still writing its development story. "If we copy the past, we'll inherit its mistakes," Kant's argument suggests. "If we build differently, India won't just catch up with the world. It could show the world a different way forward."