Amid Outcry From Startups, Centre Exempts Healthcare, Agri Platforms From New AI Advisory

Amid a major outcry over the Centre’s new advisory that mandates prior approvals for AI models before their launch in India, IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Monday (March 4) clarified that startups and certain sector-specific platforms will be exempted from the directive. 

As per Moneycontrol, the minister said that the new advisory will not be applicable for platforms working in the healthcare and agriculture sectors. He, however, reiterated that social media platforms will come under the purview of the new mandates. 

Vaishnaw said proper training of AI models is necessary to ensure the safety of citizens and the country’s democracy.

“Whether an AI model has been tested or not… is important to ensure the safety of citizens and democracy. That’s why the advisory has been brought… Some people came and said sorry we didn’t test the model enough. That is not right. Social media platforms have to take responsibility of (for) what they are doing,” Vaishnaw said.

The IT minister also said that the directives are not a “regulatory framework” but rather an advisory to “test your (AI) model before launching”.

Earlier in the day, minister of state (MoS) for electronics and information technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar said that the advisory pertains to “significant platforms” and not startups.

“Advisory is aimed at the significant platforms, and permission seeking from MeitY is only for large platforms and will not apply to startups,” Chandrasekhar said in a post on X. 

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) issued the advisory on March 1, mandating digital platforms to seek prior approval before launching any AI product in India.

Warning of penal consequences for non-compliance, the advisory also directed platforms to label under-trial AI models and ensure that no unlawful content is hosted on their sites. 

However, domestic as well as global founders of AI startups criticised the advisory. While Perplexity AI’s Aravind Srinivas termed it a “bad move”, Kissan AI founder Pratik Desai called the advisory demotivating.

Responding to the criticism, Chandrasekhar said that the government is supportive of AI and added that “India’s ambitions in AI and ensuring Internet users get a safe and trusted internet are not binaries”.