Microsoft deepening its commitment to India's AI ecosystem, says Satya Nadella
Bengaluru (PTI): Microsoft Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella on Thursday said the company is deepening its commitment to India's artificial intelligence ecosystem with massive infrastructure investments.
Microsoft is also strengthening its cloud footprint and focusing on skilling millions of Indians for an AI-driven future, he said.
Speaking at a Microsoft event here, Nadella said, "We are very excited about investing in India to make sure that we're able to bring the best in class infrastructure here, the USD 17.5 billion investment," calling it Microsoft's largest investment in Asia.
The Microsoft Chairman underlined the rapid expansion of the company's cloud footprint across the country.
"We're building on Azure as the world's computer and we have 70 plus data centre regions all over the world. In India, the footprint continues to grow. We now have central India, West India, South India, and we have a partnership with Jio as well," he said.
He further said that a new data centre region would become operational in 2026.
"We are very excited that in 2026, we will have a new DC in south central and then the most exciting part for me is that it's 100 per cent sustainable," he said.
Nadella also emphasised the importance of digital sovereignty and cybersecurity in an era of expanding AI deployment.
"We are taking sovereignty and making sure that there's a portfolio of options for sovereignty. So you have the public cloud, you have sovereign controls in public cloud..." he noted.
He warned that sovereignty cannot be viewed in isolation from security.
"Cyber security is a signals game--you can be sovereign and not have global intelligence--you'll be vulnerable in fact," he said, noting that Microsoft processes "trillions of daily signals" to secure platforms from Azure to Windows.
Nadella said he recently met Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was very encouraging of this investment (USD 17.5 billion), in particular, to drive society, the economy and growth.
This commitment, he noted, comes on top of the USD three billion investment he had announced during his last visit.
On India's talent landscape, Nadella said the company will double down on its skilling programmes.
"We are now going to skill 20 million people across India in AI skills," he said, adding that initiatives such as the government's E-Shram programme demonstrate how AI can uplift unorganised workers.
He also highlighted India's growing influence in the global developer ecosystem.
"India is slated to become the number one community in the world with GitHub by 2030," he said, praising the "engagement and the type of projects that are coming out of this place, the contributions from India."
GitHub is a web-based platform for version control and collaboration that is primarily used by developers to store, manage, and share software code. It is built on top of Git, an open-source version control system, and provides a user-friendly graphical interface and a large suite of collaboration tools.
Nadella closed his speech by reiterating Microsoft's mission. "At the end of the day, this is all about empowering every person and every organisation in India to be able to achieve more. Let's keep building."
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Single higher education regulator bill tabled in LS; Oppn flags ‘centralisation,' JPC likely
New Delhi: A bill to set up a 13-member body to regulate institutions of higher education was introduced in the Lok Sabha on Monday.
Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan introduced the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, which seeks to establish an overarching higher education commission along with three councils for regulation, accreditation, and ensuring academic standards for universities and higher education institutions in India.
Meanwhile, the move drew strong opposition, with members warning that it could weaken institutional autonomy and result in excessive centralisation of higher education in India.
The Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, 2025, earlier known as the Higher Education Council of India (HECI) Bill, has been introduced in line with the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020.
The proposed legislation seeks to merge three existing regulatory bodies, the University Grants Commission (UGC), the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), and the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), into a single unified body called the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan.
At present, the UGC regulates non-technical higher education institutions, the AICTE oversees technical education, and the NCTE governs teacher education in India.
Under the proposed framework, the new commission will function through three separate councils responsible for regulation, accreditation, and the maintenance of academic standards across universities and higher education institutions in the country.
According to the Bill, the present challenges faced by higher educational institutions due to the multiplicity of regulators having non-harmonised regulatory approval protocols will be done away with.
The higher education commission, which will be headed by a chairperson appointed by the President of India, will cover all central universities and colleges under it, institutes of national importance functioning under the administrative purview of the Ministry of Education, including IITs, NITs, IISc, IISERs, IIMs, and IIITs.
At present, IITs and IIMs are not regulated by the University Grants Commission (UGC).
Government to refer bill to JPC; Oppn slams it
The government has expressed its willingness to refer it to a joint committee after several members of the Lok Sabha expressed strong opposition to the Bill, stating that they were not given time to study its provisions.
Responding to the opposition, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said the government intends to refer the Bill to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) for detailed examination.
Congress Lok Sabha MP Manish Tewari warned that the Bill could result in “excessive centralisation” of higher education. He argued that the proposed law violates the constitutional division of legislative powers between the Union and the states.
According to him, the Bill goes beyond setting academic standards and intrudes into areas such as administration, affiliation, and the establishment and closure of university campuses. These matters, he said, fall under Entry 25 of the Concurrent List and Entry 32 of the State List, which cover the incorporation and regulation of state universities.
Tewari further stated that the Bill suffers from “excessive delegation of legislative power” to the proposed commission. He pointed out that crucial aspects such as accreditation frameworks, degree-granting powers, penalties, institutional autonomy, and even the supersession of institutions are left to be decided through rules, regulations, and executive directions. He argued that this amounts to a violation of established constitutional principles governing delegated legislation.
Under the Bill, the regulatory council will have the power to impose heavy penalties on higher education institutions for violating provisions of the Act or related rules. Penalties range from ₹10 lakh to ₹75 lakh for repeated violations, while establishing an institution without approval from the commission or the state government could attract a fine of up to ₹2 crore.
Concerns were also raised by members from southern states over the Hindi nomenclature of the Bill. N.K. Premachandran, an MP from the Revolutionary Socialist Party representing Kollam in Kerala, said even the name of the Bill was difficult to pronounce.
He pointed out that under Article 348 of the Constitution, the text of any Bill introduced in Parliament must be in English unless Parliament decides otherwise.
DMK MP T.M. Selvaganapathy also criticised the government for naming laws and schemes only in Hindi. He said the Constitution clearly mandates that the nomenclature of a Bill should be in English so that citizens across the country can understand its intent.
Congress MP S. Jothimani from Tamil Nadu’s Karur constituency described the Bill as another attempt to impose Hindi and termed it “an attack on federalism.”
_vb_22.jpeg)
