Parliament Question: Integration of Regional Language Models to Strengthen IndiaAI Mission

GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF ELECTRONICS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 3915 TO BE ANSWERED ON: 12.08.2026 INTEGRATION OF REGIONAL LANGUAGE MODELS TO STRENGTHEN INDIA AI MISSION 3915. SHRI BAJRANG MANOHAR SONWANE: Will the Minister of ELECTRONICS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY be pleased to state: (a) whether the Government has assessed the increasing incidence of digital financial frauds, cyber scams and “digital arrest” frauds affecting rural districts particularly Beed in Maharashtra and if so, the details thereof during the last three years; (b) whether the Government proposes to establish district-level Cyber Hygiene and Digital Awareness Centres in tier-2 and tier-3 regions for educating farmers, students, women, senior citizens and small traders regarding safe digital practices and if so, the details thereof; (c) whether the Government has any proposal to strengthen the IndiaAI Mission by integrating regional language models including Marathi, so that digital public services, cyber awareness and technical assistance are easily accessible to rural citizens and if so, the details thereof; and (d) whether the Government proposes to introduce a dedicated 24×7 multilingual cyber helpline, mobile application, WhatsApp-based support and village-level digital assistance mechanism to enable people in districts like Beed to report cyber frauds immediately and receive timely guidance and if so, the details thereof? ANSWER MINISTER OF STATE FOR ELECTRONICS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (SHRI JITIN PRASADA) (a) to (d): The policies of Government of India are aimed at ensuring open, safe, trusted and accountable cyberspace for users in the country. The Government is cognizant of the risks and harms arising from the misuse of digital technologies including Cyber Frauds. The Barathiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, the Information Technology Act, 2000, the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 and other related laws have together established a framework to address cyber frauds. The Information Technology Act, 2000 (“IT Act”): ● Section 66C prescribes an imprisonment of up-to three years and fine which may extend to rupees one lakh for identity theft. ● Section 66D prescribes an imprisonment of up-to three years and fine which may extend to rupees one lakh for cheating by personation by using computer resources. ● Section 66 prescribes a punishment of up to three years or with fine which may extend to five lakh rupees or both for computer related offences. ● Section 43 prescribes penalty and compensation for damage to computers, computer systems etc.Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023 The BNS, 2023 addresses the offences involving Organized Crime (Section 111), impersonating a public servant (204), extortion (308), cheating (318), cheating by personation (Section 319), forgery (Section 336) etc., and other cyber-enabled frauds. Digital awareness initiatives: Information Security Education and Awareness (ISEA): MeitY is implementing a project on ‘Information Security Education and Awareness (ISEA)’ for generating human resources in Information Security and creating general awareness on various aspects of cyber hygiene & cyber security among the masses. ● Under the mass awareness component, 6,650 awareness workshops have been conducted nationwide, covering over 11.37 lakh participants, including students, teachers, law enforcement personnel, Government officials, and the general public. ● Of these, 224 awareness workshops were conducted in Maharashtra covering 35,000+ participants. ● Further, multilingual awareness material in the form of handbooks, short videos, posters, brochures, cartoon stories for children, etc. published and disseminated through print, electronics, social media and www.isea.gov.in & https://staysafeonline.in/. National Institute of Electronics & Information Technology (NIELIT): NIELIT, an autonomous scientific society under MeitY and the national-level capacity-building institution for the IT and Electronics sector, is undertaking various initiatives in emerging technologies such as AI, Cyber Security, Cyber Law, and Cloud Computing to equip youth with future- ready skills. ● NIELIT delivers training through its wide network of 56 Centres and 9,000+ Partner Institutes across the country. ● NIELIT has 01 (one) own Centre in Maharashtra (at Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar) for overall monitoring of skill development activities in the State. ● In the State of Maharashtra, NIELIT has a presence with 700+ Partner institutes including 16 in Beed District for delivering training and awareness. ● In the IT and ITES sector, NIELIT’s programmes cover a range of technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, Cyber Security, Cloud Computing, Blockchain, Data Science, Office Automation, Multimedia and other digital technologies. ● In the last 3 years, NIELIT has trained 1.2 lakh + in the State of Maharashtra, under various programmes and courses. NIELIT Digital University (NDU) Platform: NIELIT has also launched NIELIT Digital University (NDU) Platform to deliver online and blended skill- based courses in emerging technology areas such as Artificial Intelligence, Cybersecurity, Cloud Computing, and other frontier domains. ● This platform also features built-in virtual labs for real-time experimentation in Semiconductor Design, Cyber Security, Cyber Forensics, Industry 4.0 and other emerging domains. ● Through the NDU platform, every learner can have access anytime-anywhere to National Skills Qualifications Framework (NSQF) aligned courses thus aiding to bridge the digital divide. ● So far 2.77 lakh+ candidates have registered under the NIELIT Digital University Platform.E-SafeHER: It is a Cyber Security Awareness Training initiative anchored under MeitY’s Information Security Education and Awareness (ISEA) programme through C-DAC Hyderabad. It aims to strengthen last mile cybersecurity awareness, particularly among women in rural India, who are increasingly engaging with digital platforms for financial transactions, livelihoods and access to essential services. IndiaAI Mission - Regional language models The Government, through the IndiaAI Mission and the Digital India BHASHINI is strengthening India's multilingual AI ecosystem to make digital public services accessible in Indian languages, including Marathi, while also expanding AI support for tribal languages such as Bhili. Marathi is supported on BHASHINI through foundational language technologies including Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR), Text-to-Speech (TTS), Neural Machine Translation (NMT), Optical Character Recognition (OCR), Transliteration and Voice-based Conversational AI. BHASHINI continues to strengthen Marathi language resources through the development of high-quality language datasets, AI-enabled language technologies and ecosystem partnerships, enabling more accurate, inclusive and context-aware AI applications. As India's AI-powered Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) for Languages, BHASHINI today supports 36 Indian text languages and 23 Indian voice languages, powers over 800 government websites, has enabled more than 9 billion cumulative AI inferences, and processes over 24 million AI inferences daily, enabling seamless language-first access to digital public services. Under the IndiaAI Mission and the BHASHINI ecosystem, the Government is promoting the development of indigenous multilingual AI applications and high-quality language datasets through collaboration with academia, startups, research institutions, industry and language experts. Similar efforts are being extended to low-resource and tribal languages, including Bhili, to promote linguistic inclusion and ensure that citizens, particularly in rural and underserved areas, can access AI-enabled government services in their preferred language. The National Cybercrime Reporting Portal (NCRP) NCRP was dedicated to the nation by the Hon’ble Home Minister of India on 20th January 2020. (https://cybercrime.gov.in/). The key features of the NCRP Portal include: ● All types of Cybercrime incidents can be reported from anywhere. ● National/State/District-Level monitoring dashboards. ● Online status tracking facility for the complainant. ● A new Module “Citizen Financial Cyber Fraud Reporting and Management System” has been developed, connecting 85 Banks/Payment Intermediaries and Wallets etc. with the Cybercrime Backend Portal. This helps citizens to report cyber financial frauds on National Helpline number 1930.1930 National Helpline number is running in all States/UTs. “Police” and “Public Order” are State subjects as per the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution of India. The States/UTs are primarily responsible for the prevention, detection, investigation and prosecution of crimes including digital financial frauds, cyber scams, digital arrest frauds and other cybercrimes through their Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs). The Central Government supplements the initiatives of the States/UTs through advisories and financial assistance under various schemes for capacity building of their LEAs.The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) compiles and publishes the statistical data on crimes in its publication “Crime in India”. The latest published report may be accessed on: https://www.ncrb.gov.in. ******