One of the main promises of technology development is for it to be adopted by people, organizations, societies, and governments -- incorporated into their life, work stream, or processes. Often, this is socially beneficial as it automates mundane tasks, frees up more time for other more important things, or otherwise improves the lives of those who use the technology. However, these beneficial results do not apply in every scenario and may not impact everyone in a system the same way. Sometimes a technology is developed which produces both benefits and inflicts some harm. These harms may come at a higher cost to some people than others, raising the question: {\it how are benefits and harms weighed when deciding if and how a socially consequential technology gets developed?} The most natural way to answer this question, and in fact how people first approach it, is to compare the new technology to what used to exist. As such, in this work, I make comparative analyses between humans and machines in three scenarios and seek to understand how sentiment about a technology, performance of that technology, and the impacts of that technology combine to influence how one decides to answer my main research question.

India is shifting quickly to become digital on the backdrop of a robust foundation of IT industry and swiftly moving on the cusp of a data revolution. An average Indian today consumes approximately 8.3 GB data per month, a 92 per cent increase compared to the data consumption four years ago, and by 2022 the per capita data consumption is expected to touch 14 GB. By 2022, the next half billion Indians will come online for the first time through their mobile phones. The immense digital presence of Indians in terms of 1.25 billion Aadhaar, 1.2 billion mobile phones and 1 billion bank accounts requires colossal digital infrastructure for storage and processing of data. This massive amount of data appetite of a digital-first nation has opened magnificent avenues for businesses and government alike.

What hits a visitor to India first, quite literally, is the traffic. The combination of inadequate road infrastructure, increasing vehicle population, and poor driver training and discipline makes for a chaotic and often deadly mix. The result is a high rate of road accidents, with the estimate of fatalities ranging from one every four minutesa to over 238,000 each year.b There is much ongoing work in academia, industry, and startups on using artificial intelligence (AI) and Internet of Things (IoT) technologies to improve the situation. The general goal is to have affordable technologies that work with humans through effective monitoring and feedback, rather than replacing humans through full autonomy.