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Ajay Chaturvedi 
French President Emmanuel Macron lauded India's achievements in the artificial intelligence domain and praised the country for creating a digital ecosystem that serves 1.4 billion people. Addressing the AI summit, Macron thanked the people of India for the warm welcome he received. He also warned about digital safety, especially for teenagers and children, stressing the need for responsible use of emerging technologies.
Beginning his address at the India AI Impact Summit with a traditional “namaste”, Macron said India had “built what no other country can”.Illustrating his point, he referred to a roadside vendor in Mumbai and how the spread of digital payments transformed daily life. “Ten years ago, a street vendor in Mumbai could not open a bank account — no address, no papers, no access. But today that same vendor accepts payments on his phone,” he said, pointing to the success of the Unified Payments Interface (UPI).“That is not a technology story. That is a civilisational story,” Macron added.At the five-day summit attended by global policymakers, innovators and business leaders, he hailed India’s progress in adopting and democratising AI know-how.“India built something no other country in the world can — a digital identity for 1.4 billion people, a payment system that now processes 20 billion transactions every month, a health infrastructure that has issued 500 million digital health IDs,” he said.
#WATCH | Delhi: At the #IndiaAIImpactSummit2026, French President Emmanuel Macron says, "I started with a story about a street vendor in Mumbai. Ten years ago, the world told India that 1.4 billion people could not be brought into the digital economy. India proved them wrong.… pic.twitter.com/klKt5G1ans
— ANI (@ANI) February 19, 2026
Referring to India Stack as an open, interoperable and sovereign digital framework, Macron noted that the country had proven skeptics wrong. “Ten years ago, the world said 1.4 billion people could not be brought into the digital economy. India proved them wrong. And today, some say AI is a game only the biggest can play,” he remarked.Echoing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s emphasis on human-centric progress, Macron said the future of AI must combine innovation with responsibility.He underlined that access to AI for all is critical and said India and France share a common vision of sovereign AI that protects people while fostering prosperity. Calling for global cooperation, Macron said the conversation must shift from “let’s do more” to “let’s do better together,” reinforcing the summit’s focus on responsible and inclusive artificial intelligence.
