Prime Minister Narendra Modi attended the VivaTech 2026 [1] summit in Paris to position India as a leading global technology and AI hub.
The appearance marks a strategic effort by India to shape international standards for artificial intelligence. By serving as the official AI Country Partner, India is signaling its intent to move beyond software services into the leadership of AI governance and infrastructure.
During the event, Modi emphasized the need for a balanced approach to the technology. He said AI should be "human-centric rather than machine-centric, sensitive and responsible rather than reckless" [1].
Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri said that India was the AI country of focus at VivaTech this year [3]. The participation highlighted India's ambition to export its model of digital public infrastructure to the rest of the world.
Modi linked the country's AI goals to its broader history of digitalization. He said India's technological progress over the past decade had been driven by innovation at scale, and a commitment to ensuring that technology benefits all sections of society [2].
This focus on inclusivity is a central pillar of India's pitch to global investors and partners. Modi said that for India, AI means "all-inclusive," suggesting that the technology should be used to bridge societal gaps rather than widen them [2].
His message in Paris mirrored a similar push for ethics over raw efficiency, a sentiment shared in discussions with other global leaders during the summit [1].
“India was the AI country of focus at VivaTech this year.”
India's role as the AI Country Partner at VivaTech 2026 suggests a shift in its global branding from a provider of IT labor to a leader in ethical AI framework design. By emphasizing 'human-centric' and 'all-inclusive' AI, New Delhi is attempting to carve out a middle path between the market-driven approach of the US and the state-controlled model of China, positioning itself as the voice of the Global South in the AI era.
