Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said that Digital India has become a people’s movement and is central to building an Aatmanirbhar Bharat and making India a trusted innovation partner to the world.
In a blog marking ten years of the Digital India programme, He said India is moving from digital governance to global digital leadership, and from India-first to India-for-the-world.
Mr. Modi wrote that while decades were once spent doubting the ability of Indians to use technology, this mindset has changed.
Similarly, he noted that instead of believing technology would deepen inequality, it is now being used to bridge the gap between the haves and the have-nots. He emphasised that when the intent is right, innovation empowers the less empowered, and that inclusive approaches have brought meaningful changes to the lives of those on the margins.
This belief, he said, laid the foundation of Digital India, a mission to democratise access, build an inclusive digital infrastructure, and create opportunities for all.
The Prime Minister highlighted that over 42 lakh kilometres of Optical Fibre Cable, equivalent to 11 times the distance between Earth and the Moon, now connects even the most remote villages.
Prime Minister Modi said that India’s 5G rollout is among the fastest in the world, with 4.81 lakh base stations installed in just two years. The Prime Minister said high-speed internet has reached not just urban centres, but also forward military posts, including Galwan, Siachen, and Ladakh.
He said platforms under India’s Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI), such as Aadhaar, CoWIN, DigiLocker, FASTag, PM-WANI, and One Nation One Subscription, are now being studied and adopted globally. He mentioned that CoWIN enabled the world’s largest vaccination drive, issuing over 220 crore QR-verifiable certificates. He added DigiLocker now serves 54 crore users and hosts more than 775 crore documents.
Mr. Modi said that India has emerged among the top three startup ecosystems globally, with over 1.8 lakh startups.
He called this growth not just a startup movement, but a tech renaissance. He also underlined India’s strength in AI talent penetration and AI skill concentration among its youth.
The Prime Minister said India is now the most affordable compute destination with the $1.2 billion India AI Mission, which has enabled access to 34,000 GPUs at globally unmatched rates, less than $1 per GPU hour.
He added that India is championing humanity-first AI, and the New Delhi Declaration on AI promotes innovation with responsibility. Mr. Modi concluded that the next decade will be even more transformative.
