New Initiatives to Enhance AI in Healthcare
New Delhi: In a major development for the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) in public healthcare, Union Health Minister Jagat Prakash Nadda is set to introduce two important initiatives on Tuesday. These initiatives aim to establish safe and effective AI tools for healthcare settings.
During the India AI Summit at Bharat Mandapam, Nadda will present the Strategy for Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare for India (SAHI) and BODH, the Benchmarking Open Data Platform for Health AI.
SAHI represents the country’s first comprehensive framework for using AI in hospitals, public health programs, and digital health systems. The strategy emphasizes that AI should support, rather than replace, healthcare professionals, and it outlines essential principles such as transparency and accountability. It also offers guidance on governance and data management while fostering innovation focused on public health needs.
Complementing this framework, BODH serves as a national platform for evaluating AI tools before they are widely implemented. Created by IIT Kanpur in partnership with the National Health Authority through the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission, the platform allows AI models to be tested against various real-world health data without compromising patient privacy. This ensures that the AI systems are reliable across different hospitals and patient groups.
Officials indicate that these initiatives mark a transition from trial phases to structured oversight as AI increasingly plays a role in areas like diagnostics and disease management. By coupling a national policy with a privacy-focused testing platform, the government aims to ensure innovation remains safe within the vital healthcare sector.
These announcements are part of the ongoing five-day India AI Summit 2026, taking place in the Global South for the first time, where healthcare AI is identified as a crucial aspect of India’s digital public infrastructure strategy.
