IIT Madras unveils Bodhan AI to build sovereign education ecosystem

India is set to expand the use of artificial intelligence in education as IIT Madras, through Bodhan AI, unveiled plans to build a sovereign, AI-driven education ecosystem in partnership with Sarvam AI. The announcement was made at the Bharat Bodhan AI Conclave 2026 in New Delhi.

Addressing Technical Session 1 on school education and classroom solutions, Prof Mitesh M Khapra of the Wadhwani School of Data Science and AI, IIT Madras, said, "Education has always been at the heart of India's aspirations. From our ancient universities to modern schools, we, as a country and a civilization, have always believed in the power of education to shape the future.”

“Today, we are at a historic moment: this belief remains unchanged, but the tools available to us to accelerate innovation in this space have changed dramatically. It is up to us to make use of this new form of AI, which is a resource that can be replicated, adapted, and distributed at scale,” Khapra added.

He continued, "For decades, we have known that high-quality education depends on access to great teaching and content, personalized practice, and timely, patient feedback. For the first time in history, we now have the capability to deliver all three at scale, for every citizen, in every language.”

“By building Bodhan AI as part of India's Digital Public Infrastructure for education, we are ensuring that this capability is sovereign, inclusive, and designed for public good, strengthening teachers, empowering learners, and supporting the nation's long-term educational transformation,” he added.

During the conclave, IIT Madras announced the formation of an International Advisory Council chaired by Prof Sethuraman Panchanathan of Arizona State University to bring global best practices in education.

Dr Pratyush Kumar, co-founder of Sarvam AI, said, "The reality is that AI is rapidly progressing. By the end of this calendar year, it would not be surprising if, in top companies worldwide, 100% of programming were done by AI. By programming, I mean coding. This is the reality. This is not hype. What this means for the next year and the year after that, no one knows.”

“And that is scary, exciting, and also challenging from a point of view of how we approach various things like education, research, etc. The scientific challenge is to reach a point where AI is building AI and a critical mass of self-improvement is achieved,” he added.

Kumar continued, “While that is the challenge animating most of the world, I think in India, this challenge, which is that we have a population of 1.4 billion people who need to be productively and satisfactorily involved in life, is an important problem as well. I see the problem of Artificial General Intelligence as one of how to make AI and life sustainable."

In his inaugural address, IIT Madras Director Prof V Kamakoti said, "This Conclave is a very firm step taken by the Ministry of Education, Government of India, in line with the visionary statement of Swami Vivekananda, 'If the poor cannot afford Education, then the Education must reach the poor.' As aptly articulated in the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, we believe that AI is the technology that can comprehensively solve this problem.”

“At the outset, I thank the Ministry of Education, Government of India, under the able guidance of Shri Dharmendra Pradhan, Hon'ble Education Minister, to have conceived the idea of setting up a Centre of Excellence in AI for Education and assigning the responsibility of hosting the Centre of Excellence to IIT Madras,” Kamakoti added.

He continued, "We have an immediate need to reach the Gross Enrollment Ratio of 50% by 2035, as envisaged in the NEP 2020. We firmly believe that AI has the potential to solve this problem, creating the most positive impact in society and democratizing education for all.”

“We decided to explore the full landscape of available solutions in our country to understand what is available, what could be refined, and what needs to be built. We intend to provide a sovereign, robust, digital public infrastructure for AI in education,” he added.

The conclave is part of the mandate of the Centre of Excellence in Artificial Intelligence for Education set up by the Ministry of Education at IIT Madras to advance scalable, India-focused AI solutions aligned with NEP 2020 and national digital frameworks.

Bodhan AI will align with NIPUN Bharat and Samagra Shiksha and integrate with platforms such as DIKSHA, APAAR, Vidya Samiksha Kendras, and state management information systems.

The platform will support multiple Indian languages, align with NCERT and SCERT curricula, enable AI-assisted assessments, and incorporate safeguards for safety and bias.

It will also advance research to help AI systems interpret handwritten notebooks, textbooks, video content, and contextual learning materials relevant to Indian classrooms.