Can India become the global hub for trusted AI?

Can India become the global hub for trusted AI?

For much of the past three years, the global conversation around artificial intelligence has resembled an arms race. Countries have competed to build larger models, secure access to advanced chips, attract top talent, and unlock the economic potential of generative AI. The winners, it was assumed, would be those with the deepest compute reserves, the largest datasets, and the fastest innovation cycles. But the AI race is evolving. The first phase was about infrastructure. The second was about applications. The third, and arguably most consequential phase, is about governance. As AI systems move beyond experimentation and begin influencing lending decisions, hiring outcomes, healthcare recommendations, insurance assessments, and public services, a more fundamental question is emerging: who can be trusted to govern AI at scale?