Will Artificial Intelligence create new jobs or destroy them?

As the government faces a difficult choice in keeping up with the rest of the world in AI development while making sure it does not add to unemployment, it has set up a task force to draw up a policy for the accelerated deployment of AI. A government task force is seeking public opinion on deploying artificial intelligence in manufacturing, healthcare, agriculture and the Aadhaar programme. The task force, set up in August, has been asked to draw up a policy for the accelerated deployment of AI and a five-year road map for its use in government and industry research programmes. "The job of the task force is to look at how we can use AI and the topic is so big we thought the public should also participate in it," said V Kamakoti, professor of IIT Madras, who is chairing the task force. The task force includes Gautam Shroff, vice-president and chief scientist at TCS Research; Ashwini Asokan, co-founder and chief executive officer of AI startup Mad Street Den; GH Rao, head of engineering and R&D services at HCL Technologies; and representative from various ministries.