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Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw Stresses Social Media Accountability & AI Governance; Open to New Law

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Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw Stresses Social Media Accountability & AI Governance; Open to New Law

Union Minister calls for a balanced approach to combat fake news while safeguarding freedom of speech

Eight projects initiated for creating tools and technologies within the country to address privacy and Artificial Intelligence (AI) governance

Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw, Union Minister of Electronics and Information Technology, Railways and Information & Broadcasting, while addressing questions on AI governance and development in Parliament, highlighted the critical challenges posed by the emerging AI landscape, social media accountability, and the need for robust legal frameworks. The Minister underlined the importance of balancing freedom of speech with the responsibility to combat fake news and ensure accurate narratives in the digital age.

Freedom vs Accountability: A call for consensus

“It is a major challenge that societies across the world are facing—the accountability of social media, particularly in the context of fake news and the creation of fake narratives,” Shri Vaishnaw remarked. He emphasized that establishing societal and legal accountability requires a significant consensus. “These are the issues where freedom of speech comes on one hand and accountability and having a proper real news network getting created, on the other hand. These are things which need to be debated and if the house agrees and if there is a consensus in the entire society we can come up with the new law.” he added.

Privacy-centric indigenous AI Solutions

The Union Minister also addressed concerns about privacy and Artificial Intelligence (AI) governance, sharing details of proactive measures taken by the government to develop indigenous tools and technologies.

He said that under the AI Mission, one of the key pillars is Application Development, focusing on innovations that align with India’s unique requirements. “To address the emerging landscape of AI, we have initiated eight projects aimed at creating tools and technologies within the country” he added.

The details of the selected projects under “Safe & Trusted AI” Pillar are as under:

S. No.	NAME OF THE THEME	SELECTED APPLICANT	TITLE OF THE PROJECT
1	Machine Unlearning	IIT Jodhpur	Machine Unlearning in Generative Foundation Models
2	Synthetic Data Generation	IIT Roorkee	Design and Development of Method for Generating Synthetic Data for Mitigating Bias in Datasets; and Framework for Mitigating Bias in Machine Learning Pipeline for Responsible AI
3	AI Bias Mitigation Strategy	National Institute of Technology Raipur	Development of Responsible Artificial Intelligence for Bias Mitigation in Health Care Systems
4	Explainable AI Framework	DIAT Pune and Mindgraph Technology Pvt. Ltd.	Enabling Explainable and Privacy Preserving AI for Security
5	Privacy Enhancing Strategy	IIT Delhi, IIIT Delhi, IIT Dharwad andTelecommunication Engineering Center (TEC)	Robust Privacy-Preserving Machine Learning Models
6	AI Governance Testing Framework	Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeethamand Telecommunication Engineering Center (TEC)	Track-LLM, Transparency, Risk Assessment, Context & Knowledge for Large Language Models
7	AI Ethical Certification Framework	IIIT Delhi andTelecommunication Engineering Center (TEC)	Tools for assessing fairness of AI model
8	AI Algorithm Auditing Tool	Civic Data Labs	ParakhAI – An open-source framework and toolkit for Participatory Algorithmic Auditing

India: Global Leader in AI Governance and Policy

“Ethical issues in AI are a global concern, and India is committed to addressing these challenges through robust debate and responsible innovation. The tools developed under these projects will ensure that India stays at the forefront of ethical AI development,” Shri Vaishnaw explained.

The Minister also highlighted India’s global leadership in AI. “India is one of the leading countries in shaping global thought on AI governance. Last year, India became the chair of Global Partnership on AI (GPAI) and held the Summit this year, and India’s voice continues to hold significant weight in discussions with international bodies, including the OECD and United Nations,” he said.