.png)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi took centre stage at the India AI Impact Summit 2026 in New Delhi on Thursday, delivering a sweeping, philosophically grounded address before a gathering of 118 nations and the most powerful names in global technology - from Google CEO Sundar Pichai and OpenAI's Sam Altman to Anthropic's Dario Amodei and French President Emmanuel Macron - to lay out India's vision for how artificial intelligence must be governed, democratised, and directed in the decades ahead.
In a speech that oscillated between the urgency of the present and the weight of history, Modi argued that AI is not merely a technological shift but a civilisational inflection point - one that demands moral clarity as much as technical mastery. "AI is a transformative power," he said. "If directionless, it becomes a disruption; if the right direction is found, it becomes a solution
The MANAV Vision: Putting Humanity at the Heart of AI
The centrepiece of the Prime Minister's address was the unveiling of what he called the MANAV Vision - a five-point framework for ethical and inclusive AI governance, named after the Hindi word for human. Each letter of MANAV, he explained, represents a foundational principle.
M stands for Moral and Ethical Systems - that AI must be anchored in ethical guidance. A stands for Accountable Governance - transparent rules and robust oversight. N stands for National Sovereignty - "whose data, his right." The second A stands for Accessible and Inclusive - that AI must be a multiplier, not a monopoly. And V stands for Valid and Legitimate - that AI must be lawful and verifiable
This MANAV vision of India will become an important link for the welfare of humanity in the AI-based world of the 21st century," Modi said, presenting the framework not as India's unilateral declaration but as its contribution to a global conversation that is still being shaped.
The choice of the word MANAV was deliberate and pointed. In a room full of talk about parameters, compute, and capability benchmarks, the Prime Minister's insistence on centering the human - morally, legally, and politically — was a rebuke to any conception of AI progress that treats people as incidental to the enterprise.
'Humans are not raw material'
Modi drew some of the sharpest applause of the evening when he turned to the question of power and inclusion. "For AI, humans are just data points," he said bluntly. "To ensure that humans are not reduced to mere raw material, AI must be democratised. It must be made a medium for inclusion and empowerment, especially in the Global South."
He reached for an analogy to make the stakes concrete. "We must give AI an open sky and also keep the command in our hands, like GPS. GPS shows us the way, but the final call on which direction we should go is ours. The direction in which we take AI today will determine our future."
The comparison was simple, but its implications were vast — a direct challenge to the concentration of AI power in a handful of companies and countries, and an argument that nations of the Global South must be architects of the AI era, not merely its beneficiaries.
In one of the address's most striking passages, Modi reached back into the 20th century to frame the choice the world faces now. "We have to have a big vision and shoulder an equally big responsibility," he said. "Along with the present generation, we also have to worry about what form of AI we will hand over to the coming generations."
"The real question today is not what Artificial Intelligence can do in the future. The question is, what do we do with Artificial Intelligence in the present? Such questions have come before humanity before. The most powerful example is nuclear power. We have seen its destruction and its positive contribution has also been seen."
The parallel served both as a sobering warning and a statement of optimism: humanity has navigated transformative, dual-use technologies before, and done so - imperfectly, haltingly - without destroying itself. The task with AI is to do better.
Children, and the problem of deepfakes
Modi was direct about the dangers that demand immediate action. He called on the global AI community to make online spaces safe for children. "We have to be more cautious regarding children's safety," he said. "The AI space should also be child safe and family guided."
On the proliferating threat of synthetic media, he called for binding global standards. "Deepfakes and fabricated content are destabilising the open society," he warned, arguing that authenticity must be built into the architecture of the internet itself. "In the digital world, content should also have authenticity labels so people know what's real and what's created with AI. As AI creates more text, images, and video, the industry increasingly needs watermarking and clear-source standards. Therefore, it's crucial that this trust is built into the technology from the start
Leave Comments