PM Narendra Modi holds roundtable with Indian AI start-ups ahead of India AI Impact Summit 2026

New Delhi, Jan 8: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday chaired a roundtable discussion with Indian artificial intelligence start-ups at his residence, 7 Lok Kalyan Marg, ahead of the India AI Impact Summit 2026, scheduled to be held in the country next month.

The meeting was attended by 12 Indian AI start-ups that have qualified for the AI for All: Global Impact Challenge at the upcoming summit. The start-ups showcased their work across a wide range of areas, including Indian-language foundation models, multilingual large language models, speech-to-text and text-to-video technologies, generative AI for e-commerce and content creation, engineering simulations and advanced analytics, as well as healthcare diagnostics and medical research.

Startup leaders praised India’s growing commitment to building a strong AI ecosystem, noting rapid sectoral growth and increasing global interest. They said India is emerging as a major hub for AI innovation and deployment, offering an enabling environment for research, development and large-scale application. Addressing the participants, the Prime Minister highlighted the transformative potential of artificial intelligence and said India’s hosting of the India AI Impact Summit would underscore its expanding role in the global technology landscape. He described start-ups and AI entrepreneurs as co-architects of India’s future and stressed the country’s capacity for both innovation and scale. PM Modi underlined the importance of developing AI models that are ethical, unbiased, transparent and grounded in data privacy. He called for a distinctive Indian approach to AI that promotes affordability, inclusion and frugal innovation, while supporting local content and regional languages under the vision of “Made in India, Made for the World”. The meeting was attended by representatives from AI firms, including Avataar, BharatGen, Fractal, Gan, Genloop, Gnani, Intellihealth, Sarvam, Shodh AI, Soket AI, Tech Mahindra and Zenteiq. Union Electronics and IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw and Minister of State Jitin Prasada were also present.