India’s financial system is entering a decisive new phase. Over the past decade, digital public infrastructure has dramatically expanded access, bringing payments, accounts, and formal financial identities to hundreds of millions. Yet access alone is no longer the defining challenge. The next frontier lies in quality of inclusion, resilience of systems, and trust at scale.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is emerging as a transformative force enabling a connective framework that links data to decisions, institutions to individuals, and efficiency to empowerment. The opportunity for India’s financial sector lies not in isolated AI pilots but in a sector-wide transformation that embeds intelligence into the core of financial systems.
A Vision for AI-Driven Financial Transformation
The Amrit Niti roundtable, convened by Prosus in collaboration with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), brought together policymakers, industry leaders, and technology experts to explore how AI can reshape India’s financial ecosystem. Part of a broader effort to develop a nationwide AI strategy that is not only relevant to India but also adaptable to the Global South, this roundtable marked the culmination of a series of discussions across sectors, including health, education, agriculture, and manufacturing, with the findings feeding into a comprehensive white paper to inform India’s AI roadmap.
India’s financial ecosystem operates at extraordinary scale and complexity. Fraud patterns are becoming more sophisticated, customer journeys more fragmented, and regulatory expectations more demanding. In this context, resilience - not speed alone - has become the central challenge.
AI as a Catalyst for Resilience and Trust
The discussions underscored that while AI’s early adoption in financial services has focused on productivity - automating processes, improving turnaround times, and reducing operational costs - its true potential lies in fostering systemic resilience and trust. Sajeesh Mathew, Member (Economics) at the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA), noted, “AI must remain useful, inclusive, and responsible, with explainability and traceability built into its deployment.” He emphasized that while AI can enhance efficiency and risk monitoring, critical decisions requiring absolute accuracy must retain human accountability.
Mathew also highlighted the importance of reducing dependency on global supply chains for AI tools and fostering domestic alternatives. “We need to ensure that AI deployment is secure, cost-effective, and aligned with India’s data sovereignty goals,” he said.
Breaking Down Silos: The Power of Unified Data
A recurring theme of the roundtable was the need to address fragmented data and decision-making in financial services. Customers interact with multiple products and entities, yet institutions often lack a unified view of their needs. This structural gap limits the ability of financial institutions to deliver personalized, relevant, and timely services.
Anindya Karmakar, Head of Data & Analytics at Aditya Birla Capital, shared insights from their journey to modernize data platforms and create a unified customer view. “AI’s real value emerges when data silos are dismantled,” he said. “By building consent-led architectures and integrating structured and unstructured data, we can deliver more personalized and effective financial solutions.”
The discussions also touched on the potential for industry-wide data-sharing frameworks. Participants emphasized the need for non-PII (Personally Identifiable Information) datasets and consent-based data sharing to enable ecosystem-wide intelligence while preserving privacy and security.
Reimagining Financial Inclusion with AI
Despite India’s digital progress, significant segments of the population remain underserved. MSMEs, women-led enterprises, and first-time borrowers continue to face barriers—not due to lack of intent, but due to rigid risk models and incomplete data. Participants at the roundtable highlighted that AI offers a path to reimagine financial inclusion - not by lowering standards, but by improving context.
Rajiv Gupta from Policy Bazaar emphasized the importance of credit awareness and financial literacy. “We’ve provided over 6.5 crore credit score statements free of cost, helping individuals understand and improve their credit scores,” he said. Gupta also highlighted the role of AI in simplifying financial products and building trust through localized, multilingual resources. “AI can help us reach underserved communities by creating video testimonials and local language content, empowering agents and customers alike.”
Hyper-Personalization: A Game-Changer for Financial Services
The roundtable emphasized the transformative potential of hyper-personalization in financial services. Aishwarya Jaishankar from Hyperface noted, “AI enables us to deliver hyper-personalized offers and solutions in real time, tailored to individual customer needs and behaviors.” She highlighted the importance of context in financial decision-making, particularly for underserved segments like farmers and first-time borrowers. “Personalization and context will be key to driving financial awareness, credit inclusion, and responsible lending.”
Fraud Prevention and Cybersecurity: A Shared Responsibility
As digital adoption accelerates, fraud has evolved from isolated incidents to systemic risks. Deepfakes, mule accounts, and coordinated attacks now exploit fragmentation across institutions. Participants highlighted the need for shared fraud detection frameworks that enable real-time information sharing without compromising privacy.
Mohit Gopal, CEO of SEA at PayU, reflecting on the payments ecosystem, noted, “Fraud detection cannot remain siloed. If one institution identifies fraudulent behavior, delays in information flow allow the same activity to surface elsewhere. A shared intelligence layer is essential to address this challenge.”
AI and Job Creation: A Balanced Perspective
The roundtable also explored the implications of AI on employment. While AI adoption may lead to job displacement in certain areas, it also creates opportunities for new roles, particularly in data annotation, model development, and AI-driven services. Rentala Chandrasekhar, Chairman of the Centre for the Digital Future, emphasized, “AI adoption in India has the potential to play out differently. By addressing unmet needs and creating new services, we can ensure that job creation outpaces displacement.”
Participants highlighted the importance of re-skilling and up-skilling the workforce to adapt to AI-driven workflows. “The task ahead is to ensure AI adoption is paired with re-skilling, mobility, and a clear narrative of opportunity,” said Vikas Agnihotri, Former Managing Director, Google India; Former Operating Partner, Softbank; and Co-chair of the roundtable.
Shailesh Paul, CEO, Wibmo (PayU Digital), echoed this view, emphasising that “AI should be understood first as a tool, one that improves decision-making, compliance, and case management before it is seen as an autonomous actor. Responsible deployment requires as much organisational change as technical capability.”
Data Sharing: Unlocking India’s Potential
India is often described as a data-rich nation, but much of this data remains siloed and underutilized. Rentala Chandrasekhar noted, “If all the data is lying in silos and there is no way for it to be shared, even voluntarily, then its potential remains untapped.” He emphasized the need for frameworks that enable the sharing of anonymized and aggregate data to support AI development while protecting privacy.
A Coordinated Path Forward
The Amrit Niti dialogue underscored a shared recognition: India has moved beyond the question of whether AI belongs in financial services. The real question is how deliberately it is embedded - at scale, with inclusion and resilience as design principles.
This requires coordination across regulators, incumbents, fintechs, and policymakers. It calls for clarity on data governance, shared intelligence frameworks, and sustained investment in skills. Above all, it demands a shift in mindset - from AI as an efficiency lever to AI as a national capability.
As Sehraj Singh, Managing Director of Prosus India, reflected, “Every major technological transition has been accompanied by uncertainty, but also by the opportunity to build more inclusive and resilient systems. AI gives India the chance to move early - not just in adoption, but in shaping how intelligence can drive financial empowerment at scale. If we align technology with trust, skills, and policy intent, AI can become a force multiplier for inclusive growth, not just efficiency.”
The choices made today will determine whether AI deepens existing divides or helps close them. Amrit Niti represents an opportunity to ensure it does the latter, embedding intelligence into India’s financial systems in a way that strengthens trust, expands opportunity, and builds resilience for the long term.
