Union Budget 2023: Centre bets big on Artificial Intelligence, IoT

Budget 2023: Nirmala Sitharaman added that the National Data Governance Policy will enable anonymised data and the KYC process will be simplified by adopting a risk-based system

In Budget 2023, the Centre proposed a series of measures like Centres of Excellence for Artificial Intelligence to unleash the potential of our economy and realise the vision of "Make AI in India and Make AI Work for India". 

Three such centres will be set up in top educational institutions. Leading industry players will partner in conducting interdisciplinary research, develop cutting-edge applications and scalable problem solutions in the areas of agriculture, health, and sustainable cities, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharama said during her Budget Speech.

Sitharaman added that the National Data Governance Policy will enable anonymised data and the KYC process will be simplified by adopting a risk-based system.

"National Data Governance policy, expected to be in line with the Data Protection Bill draft, should be the first steps to protecting citizens data and its usage. It Would be interesting to see the timelines of implementation and to what extent the government is willing to go in case of lapses to the policy," said Manoj Kumar Shastrula, CEO and founder, SOCLY.io.

Moreover, to empower youth, Sitharaman also said that PMKVY 4.0 will be launched to "skill lakhs of youth within the next three years". She added that 30 skill India international centres across states will be established for this.

Under mission Karma Yogi, centres, states and the union territories are implementing capacity-building plans for civil servants, Sitharaman said. 

The government has also launched an integrated online training platform to provide continuous learning opportunities for millions of government employees to upgrade their skills and facilitate people-centric approach.

The digital ecosystem for skilling will be further expanded with the launch of a unified skill India digital platform for enabling demand-based formal skilling, linking with employers including MSMEs and facilitating access to entrepreneurship schemes to provide stipend support to 4.7 million youth in three years.

"The Focus on AI is a step in the right direction. It'll accelerate the digitalization of the Indian economy. Indian companies in sectors like health tech, HR tech, fintech, etc will compete globally if our human capital is skilled in AI," said Sumit Sabharwal, CEO of TeamLease HRtech.