India's AI Mission Supports 20 Indigenous Models to Boost Jobs and Skills

The Indian government announced that 20 sovereign artificial‑intelligence model proposals—12 large language models (LLMs) and 8 small language models (SLMs)—have been identified for support under the IndiaAI Mission. Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnaw told Parliament that the mission aims to create economic opportunities and employment for youth while managing AI‑related risks, stating, "The Government of India is supporting Indian startups and institutions to develop large language models."

The mission’s seven pillars cover model development, applications, datasets, talent development and affordable compute. Notable projects include Sarvam AI’s 30‑billion‑parameter and 105‑billion‑parameter models, Gnani AI’s speech‑to‑speech system, BharatGen’s multilingual foundation models and Avataar AI’s video‑generation model. Fifteen compute service providers have been empanelled, 237 projects receive backing, and more than 93.18 lakh GPU hours have been allocated. Twelve national‑level hackathons have yielded 62 AI prototypes and 20 AI‑based solutions. Talent initiatives feature 686 fellowships across 178 institutions and over 2.65 million participants in the YUVA AI for All programme. The government has also established 27 India Data and AI Labs, plans 188 more, and approved 58 AI Centres of Excellence. The India AI Governance Guidelines, released on 5 November 2025, provide a framework for safe and inclusive AI development.