India has recently launched BharatGen, a breakthrough generative AI initiative designed to revolutionize public service delivery and boost citizen engagement. The initiative will be carried out by developing foundational models in language, speech, and computer vision.

Science and Technology Minister Dr. Jitendra Singh asserted that this is the world’s first government-funded multimodal LLM project aimed at creating efficient and inclusive AI in Indian languages.

Spearheaded by IIT Bombay under the National Mission on Interdisciplinary Cyber-Physical Systems (NM-ICPS), the initiative will create generative AI systems that can generate high-quality text and multimodal content in various Indian languages.

The official news release states that BharatGen will deliver generative AI models and their applications as a public good by prioritizing India’s socio-cultural and linguistic diversity. It also strives to address India’s broader needs, such as social equity, cultural preservation, and linguistic diversity, while ensuring that generative AI reaches all segments of society.

The four key features of BharatGen include:

1. Multilingual and multimodal nature of foundation models

2. Indian data set-based building and training

3. Open-source platform and

4. Development of an ecosystem of generative AI research in the country.

The project is expected to be completed in two years, and it plans to benefit several government, private, educational, and research institutions.

In addition, BharatGen aims to reduce reliance on foreign technologies and solidify the domestic AI ecosystem for startups, industries and government agencies. Its prime focus is on data-efficient learning, specifically for Indian languages with limited digital presence.

Notably, BharatGen will also foster an AI research community through training programs, hackathons, and collaborations with global experts. Its milestones till 2026 include extensive AI model development, experimentation, and the establishment of AI benchmarks tailored to India’s needs.