Shekhar Kapur: AI's Democratic Power to Add $1 Trillion to India's GDP

Speaking with ANI on the sidelines of the AI summit, Kapur talked about the growing interest in artificial intelligence among the youth.

"If you had announced a summit on AI a year ago, nobody would be here. One year later, half a million young people have come, all looking for opportunity. That's what's incredible in India," he told ANI.

He said India is an incredibly innovative nation and AI's democratic nature makes it accessible to everyone.

"I think that AI, because it's so democratic, if you haven't been to IIT, if you haven't been to the big educational institute, or you've not been to the Pune institute, it doesn't matter because AI will give you everything that you want from there. After that, it's how innovative, how courageous, how provocative, how intuitive you are," he said.

"AI brings it down and when I walk around, I see hundreds, thousands of young people. Imagine what's going to happen to India. We're going to add a trillion dollars a year to our GDP," he added.

Drawing a parallel with the early days of mobile phones in India, Kapur recalled how skepticism surrounded their adoption.

"When cell phones first came, people wondered how India would use them. Today, we are one of the largest mobile markets in the world. Certain measures were taken, bandwidth was created, and once infrastructure was in place, people adopted it rapidly," he explained.

He suggested that AI will follow a similar trajectory, driven by infrastructure and public demand. "That's how it's going to be with AI," Kapur said.

India is hosting AI Impact Summit 2026 from February 16 to 20. It is anchored in three foundational pillars, or 'Sutras': People, Planet and Progress.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the India AI Impact Expo 2026 at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi on Monday.

The Summit, the first global AI gathering to be hosted in the Global South, has witnessed unprecedented participation.

Bringing together policymakers, technology companies, innovators, academia, and industry leaders, the Summit seeks to translate global AI deliberations into actionable development outcomes under the IndiaAI Mission and the Digital India initiative.

PM Modi will deliver the inaugural address on February 19, setting the tone for enhanced global cooperation and advancing India's vision for inclusive, trusted, and development-oriented artificial intelligence.

- ANI