AI, Gen AI crucial for diverse news content reach: Former NITI Aayog CEO

Former NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant believes that news consumption is headed towards complete digitalization and with India boasting the biggest number of uploads globally, artificial intelligence will play a major role in facilitating this transition. “I can access news in real-time. By the time I get the news in the newspaper the next day it is too late in the day, it is outdated, it is jaded and by that time over the night, many other things have happened in other parts of the world which you have to catch up with. So, my view is that we are adding an internet user every three seconds. We have made a huge transformation”, Kant said at the Storyboard18 DNPA Conclave and Awards 2024. Kant’s excitement regarding the consumption of digital news is a result of India’s notable advancements in the digital domain; the country has the largest population of internet and smartphone users worldwide. “We have the highest number of uploads in the world. We are going to be the biggest internet planet in the world and you will see that everyone in this country with a billion smartphones, 900 million smartphones now, and India will become the biggest smartphone user. India will become the biggest internet user,” he said. Kant also clarified how developments in technology have impacted the news sector. He emphasizes how crucial it is for media organizations to adopt new business strategies and broaden their audience to include more people and groups. He thinks that in order to create an inclusive news environment, AI and Gen AI will be crucial in enabling news material to reach a variety of consumers speaking regional languages. He gave instances of Bhashini AI, an artificial intelligence (AI) translation tool that uses crowdsourcing, natural language processing (NLP), and AI to translate between several Indian languages in real time. “Bhashini is enabling the use of voice in rural areas to access all government schemes and access your ability to fill up forms, provide those forms, get the benefit of all government schemes in the local dialect without even reading by sheer voice,” he said. “The challenge for you will be able to provide your voice in the local dialect, and local language, you may be printing in Hindi but you should be able to provide it in Malayalam, Tamil, and local dialect using the power of AI and generative AI, and that will be the next big disruption that will take place in the world of news,” he added. India’s departure from racist models dominated by major tech companies like Google, Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Tencent, and Alibaba was the main theme of Kant’s address. He commended India for its outstanding efforts in building an open API and interoperable digital infrastructure that guarantees broad access to digital services and financial activities. Kant also praises India’s rapidly developing payment infrastructure and its progress toward a cashless economy. “Last year we did about 128 billion transactions, China was second with just 26 billion transactions but from that, we went into cashless paperless credit, we went into doing wealth creation, into stock markets, tier two, tier three. Zerodha grew, Upstox grew, and then you had new digital insurance which is fully digital, and the cost of acquisition of customers has fallen in India very rapidly”, he added.