Funding remains a major obstacle in accelerating AI research in India, compounded by a lack of motivation among researchers to pursue groundbreaking innovations. However, this cannot solely be attributed to university researchers, as strong ecosystems in the West enable the development of cutting-edge solutions. For instance, professor Dhabaleswar K (DK) Panda, a distinguished scholar at Ohio State University, presented his $20 million NSF-funded AI Institute, ICICLE, at the IEEE HiPC 2024 event in Bengaluru. Panda’s initiative focuses on democratizing AI solutions and partnering with Indian institutes to solve real-world problems in agriculture and manufacturing. In an interview with Panda, he acknowledged the funding gap between Indian and Western universities as a major factor hindering research in India. However, he remains optimistic about the potential for Indian universities to catch up, given the right resources and training for researchers. Ultimately, the success of initiatives like ICICLE depends on adequate funding and support from the government and industry, as well as a shift towards long-term, foundational research in the Indian research ecosystem.
