Goa govt working on AI roadmap with focus on skill development

Panaji: Goa govt has constituted a council for artificial intelligence (AI) to advise state govt on a six-month AI roadmap for the state. The council, which includes chief executive officers of several international companies, will be formed over the next six months.Goa’s AI roadmap will focus on skill development, funding requirements, govt policy and infrastructure requirements, and finally, a plan to attract other AI-first startups to Goa. “We want to introduce AI at the school level. The focus is to see how AI can be used for tourism, governance, and cyber security,” said chief minister Pramod Sawant. “We will scale up the startup accelerator programmes.”Sawant said that the state would try to take as much assistance from the Centre to help meet Goa’s AI goals.

The chief minister said that Goa aims to be the pioneer among states that adopt AI goals.With an intention to meet its AI goals, the department of information technology, electronics and communications (DITE&C) has roped in senior executives from McLaren Strategic Systems, American firm Omnumi, as well as former executives from PayTM Money. “We had a meeting a month ago and this is the second meeting where we have experts to brainstorm, formulate, and implement a very clear vision of Goa AI Vision 2027,” said IT minister Rohan Khaunte.

He added that the first foray into AI technologies is an AI-powered chatbot that integrates GoaOnline with WhatsApp to provide governance and public services. The Goa AI Mission 2027 aims to hasten AI adoption, AI skilling, and AI startups in the state. Khaunte said that the department wants to nurture AI-based startups that can build for Goa and scale for India.Sawant said that govt will adopt a multi-stakeholder approach by involving govt departments, startups, academia, and industry for AI.

BITS Pilani Goa, Goa Engineering College, and other academic institutions have been roped in to help formulate the policy.Of the 350 odd startups and IT companies operating in Goa, the state has at least 20 startups that are focused on purely AI technologies, Goa Technology Association president Mangirish Salelkar said. He said that the aim is to have more Goan companies venture into AI. Khaunte said the final aim is for Goans to find employment in the AI industry.