In a one-on-one interaction with Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist Bill Gates on February 29, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that health, agriculture and education are the focus areas for digital governance, and that he has been working to ensure that digital divide does not plague India. Digital governance, artificial intelligence, and deepfakes dominated the first half of the 45-minute video of the interaction which was released on Modi’s personal YouTube channel a month later on Friday.

The video was not released on any government handles including those of the Prime Minister’s Office, or the Press Information Bureau. The interaction took place at the prime minister’s official residence at 7 Race Course Road in New Delhi on February 29 but neither the video’s description nor its contents specify the date or place of the interaction.

“When I used to hear about digital divide in the world, I used to say that I will not let anything like that happen in my country. Digital public infrastructure is a big requirement for that,” Modi said.

According to ICRIER’s State of India Digital Economy 2024 report, while “India as a nation is highly digitalised, the average Indian is not”. “Nearly 48 % of Indians do not access the internet and the quality of fixed line internet services does not match up to other G20 countries.” According to IAMAI’s internet in India report 2023, at 759 million, 52% Indians have access to the internet.

The ICRIER report noted that India’s gender gap in internet connectivity is, at 10%, higher than the world average of 9%, and the rural-urban divide is at 58%, higher than the world average of 49%. While the digital divide along gender is large, it is declining, it said.

“Even when I went for the G20 summit in Indonesia [in 2022], all nations around the world were curious about how India brought about the digital revolution. I explained to them that I have democratised this technology so that nobody can have a monopoly over it. It will be of the people, by the people and whatever emerging talent in the public makes a value addition to it, that will keep happening so that common man can also trust the technology,” Modi told Gates.

In February, the parliamentary standing committee on communications and technology asked the government to promote local Indian players in the fintech sector following a submission by the ministry of electronics and information technology (MeitY) which said that Walmart-owned PhonePe and Google Pay account for 83.3% of the UPI market in the country, HT reported on February 10.

To demonstrate how he uses AI, Modi showed Gates a feature in the Narendra Modi app, commonly called the “NaMo” app, which has been created and is run by the BJP.

“I am using my NaMo App and I use AI a lot, and I find this very useful across the country,” Modi said. He asked Gates to take a selfie on the app’s Photo Booth feature. The app immediately showed Gates all photos that included the two of them over the last 20 years, causing Gates to exclaim, “Whoa!”

“Even if in some public function, even if just 1/10th part of you was visible, then it will pull all photos where that 1/10th of you is visible and where I am visible, it will retrieve that photo,” Modi said.

“Earlier, when I used to go around the country, people used to request me for my photo. Now, I tell them to go to my AI on my NaMo app, to the Photo Booth, take a selfie, and you will get all your photos with me even if you are in the corner of the photo.”

NaMo app’s chief compliance officer, nodal contact person and resident grievance officer is Amit Malviya, the national convenor of the BJP’s IT Cell. The app is a part of the narendramodi.in website which is also run by the BJP.

Watermarking for AI-generated content is an important first step: Modi

Modi said that powerful tools such as AI tools need to be used responsibly and cannot replace actual human expertise. “If we use AI as a magic[al] tool, there might be great injustice done. Or if I use AI due to laziness, [for instance] if I have to write a letter to someone and I don’t draft it [myself] and instead ask ChatGPT to draft the letter for me, that is the wrong way [of using AI]. I should be competing with ChatGPT. I should be fighting with it. … I should be trying to surpass AI,” he said.

He acknowledged the problem of being misled by AI-generated content, including but not limited to deepfakes.

“I have noticed that if such a powerful thing, if it is handed to someone without properly training them first, the chances of it being misused increase. I have spoken to all the [leading] minds linked with AI. I said that to begin with, all AI generated content should have a watermark that says that this is AI-generated so that no one is misguided. This isn’t a bad thing; it is simply AI generated so that I can ascertain its value for myself. Deepfakes – in a vast democratic country like India, if someone uploads a deepfake, for instance if someone uploads something bad in my voice, initially people will believe it and it will lead to a fire [chaos]. It is important to mention that deepfake is AI-generated and to mention its source,” he said.

This is not the first time that Modi has raised the issue around deepfakes. In November, in a public speech, he had said that deepfakes could lead to chaos. He had then said that he had seen a deepfake video of himself doing the garba. However, the video in question was not a deepfake but a video of Modi’s doppelganger dancing. His speech prompted a flurry of meetings between MeitY and social media companies about dealing with synthetically altered content and resulted in three advisories to social media companies.

In its latest advisory to eight social media platforms with more than 5 million users in India on March 15, MeitY told them to ensure that all deepfakes and misinformation are easily identifiable either through labels, or unique metadata or identifiers embedded in the content.

To be sure, deepfakes and synthetically altered content are not defined under the law and experts differ over what would meet the threshold that requires labelling. For instance, if a video of a politician’s speech is made available in multiple languages, as BJP’s Manoj Tiwari’s was in June 2020, where it appears that the politician is himself speaking in a different language, is that a deepfake? Does it require labelling? The law is unclear.

Modi told Gates, “In these initial days [of deepfakes], such steps are required; we may not need them in future. But for now, we will need to think over such dos and donts. In the same vein, I should extract that work from AI which is within my field of expertise. To use AI for something where I don’t have expertise [or understanding], [or something] I am tired or lazy about, that is not right.”

Gates asked about privacy, Modi focussed on using data for research

Gates asked Modi about how he was looking at privacy and data security related concerns, especially when AI depends on large amounts of data. “Data is a huge issue right now. We must look at its security. India has the legal framework, but we need to increase awareness too.” Modi talked about ease of living through the Digilocker which allows the data processor to retrieve the necessary personal documents of an individual.

On privacy, he said, “There are two parts here. First, we need to train the common man for quality data. Our data must have quality and clarity. Second, the data owner must know for what purpose the asking entity is going to use the data for. If the entity wants to monetise the data through an agreement, then it should be allowed [consented to by the data owner] first. The first priority should be for research. Data for research should not be priced too high else research would be too expensive. The Research institution must also assure the data owner that ‘I am using your data for this purpose. It will only be used for this purpose. And this is for global good, for the benefit of the common man’. I believe that then, nobody will refuse [to give consent].”

Digital governance

Health, agriculture and education are the focus areas for digital governance, Modi said. “I have built two lakh Ayushman Aarogya Mandir in villages that I am directly connecting them to best hospitals using modern technology,” Modi said.

“I want to fill the shortcomings of teachers with technology. Second, children are interested in visuals, storytelling, I am working towards creating that kind of conduct. I did some surveys. Children are enjoying it,” he told Gates. “In agriculture too, I am bringing a big revolution. I want to change the mindset.”