TLDR: The IndiaAI Mission has allocated Rs 1,500 crore in its third tranche of funding to bolster the nation’s artificial intelligence capabilities. BharatGen, a government-backed multimodal generative AI initiative, received the largest share of Rs 988.6 crore (or Rs 989 crore in some reports) to develop foundational AI models, including large language and multimodal models, tailored for Indian languages and contexts.
New Delhi, India – In a significant boost to India’s burgeoning artificial intelligence landscape, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has announced the third tranche of funding under its ambitious Rs 10,000 crore IndiaAI Mission. A total of Rs 1,500 crore has been allocated to accelerate the nation’s AI capabilities, with BharatGen, India’s pioneering government-backed multimodal sovereign AI initiative, emerging as the largest beneficiary, securing Rs 988.6 crore (or Rs 989 crore in some reports).
The formal announcement was made by Union Minister of Electronics & IT, Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw, at an event held in New Delhi on September 18, 2025. This substantial funding underscores BharatGen’s pivotal role in establishing and strengthening India’s sovereign AI ecosystem.
Launched just ten months ago, BharatGen is dedicated to creating foundational AI models specifically designed for Indian languages and diverse contexts. The allocated funds will primarily be directed towards acquiring crucial GPU and compute infrastructure, which are the most resource-intensive components in building advanced AI systems. Less than a quarter of the funding will cover manpower, data acquisition, and operational overheads.
Earlier this year, BharatGen unveiled ‘Param-1’, a bilingual Large Language Model (LLM) boasting 2.9 billion parameters. This model was pretrained on an extensive 5 trillion tokens in both English and Hindi. The next phase of BharatGen’s development aims to expand its reach to multilingual and multimodal AI systems across all 22 scheduled Indian languages, ensuring equitable access and inclusive innovation for every citizen.
Prof. Ganesh Ramakrishnan of IIT Bombay and Principal Investigator for BharatGen, emphasized the mission’s vision: ‘The intent is to create a national sovereign foundational model ecosystem for generative AI—bringing together top-class academia and industry, with operational grounding.’ He further highlighted AI as ‘a once-in-several-decades transformational opportunity.’
The BharatGen consortium is a collaborative effort involving leading academic and research institutions across India, including IIT Bombay, IIT Madras, IIIT Hyderabad, IIT Kanpur, IIT Hyderabad, IIT Mandi, IIM Indore, IIIT Delhi, and IIT Kharagpur. This collaborative foundation is crucial for strengthening the national AI ecosystem, enabling startups and enterprises to build upon these foundational models.
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In addition to its LLM, BharatGen has already released 3B parameter models, speech-to-text, and text-to-speech systems, which are publicly available on platforms like Hugging Face and AI Kosh India. The initiative recently partnered with IBM to scale its models for both Indian and global markets, further solidifying its commitment to advancing India’s leadership in the global technology landscape.
