IndiaAI Mission, Gates Foundation to sign MoU on AI in agriculture, healthcare: Vaishnaw

Prime Minister Narendra Modi meets Bill Gates, founder of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation & former CEO of Microsoft, in New Delhi.
| Photo Credit: ANI

The Union government’s IndiaAI Mission will soon sign a memorandum of understanding with the Gates Foundation to cooperate on “AI solutions for better crops, stronger healthcare, smarter education & climate resilience,” Minister of Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnaw said on X on Wednesday (March 19, 2025).

Bill Gates, the foundation’s chair, visited India this week, and met with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Mr. Vaishnaw, among other senior officials. The Gates Foundation was formerly known as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Mr. Vaishnaw did not provide further details on the proposed MoU. A Gates Foundation spokesperson did not respond to a query from The Hindu by press time.

AI solutions

The IndiaAI Mission aims to promote the development, research and use of artificial intelligence (AI) in India. In recent months, the Mission has begun allocating computing infrastructure — in the form of a shared pool of graphics cards — to facilitate local startups and researchers who often need a high amount of digital processing resources. 

Mr. Gates recently wrote of his meetings with farmers in Odisha, saying that he “saw farmers using AI-powered tools to predict weather patterns, choose crops, and reduce disease risks,” and that he was “looking forward to seeing how much better those tools have gotten in the short time since.”