Pradhan To Announce 3 AI - Centres Of Excellence On Healthcare, Agriculture And Sustainable Cities

New Delhi, Oct 14: Union Minister for Education, Dharmendra Pradhan will announce three AI Centres of Excellence (CoE) focused on Healthcare, Agriculture, and Sustainable Cities in New Delhi on October 15, 2024, officials said on Monday.

To realize the vision of "Viksit Bharat," these three CoEs for Artificial Intelligence (AI) will be led by top educational institutions, in consortium with industry partners and startups, the Union Ministry of Education said in a statement.

They will conduct interdisciplinary research, develop cutting-edge applications, and create scalable solutions in these three areas.

This initiative aims to galvanize an effective AI ecosystem and nurture quality human resources in these critical fields, it added.

As part of the vision to "Make AI in India and Make AI work for India," the establishment of these centres was announced under Para 60 of the Budget Announcement for 2023-24.

In alignment with this, the Government has approved the creation of the three AI Centres of Excellence, with a total financial outlay of Rs. 990.00 Cr over the period of FY 2023-24 to FY 2027-28.

To oversee the implementation of this initiative, an industry heavy Apex Committee has been constituted, co-chaired by Dr. Sridhar Vembu, Founder and CEO of Zoho Corporation.

K. Sanjay Murthy, Secretary of Higher Education will grace the occasion, along with Directors of IITs, Heads of higher educational institutions (HEIs), industry leaders, start-up founders and senior officials from various ministries of the Government of India, the Ministry said.