Sovereignty in a System Prompt February 23, 2026
The Sovereign Promise
The concept of sovereign AI is straightforward: a country should have the capability to build, train, and deploy its own AI models without depending on foreign infrastructure or corporations. For India, the case is genuinely compelling.
We have 22 officially recognized languages. Most of the world’s leading models are English-first, and I cannot really speak for their understanding of Indian languages, culture, and context. There are real concerns about data sovereignty - users’ data flowing through American and Chinese servers, and the dependency problem: access subject to foreign laws, interests and policies.
These are legitimate reasons to pursue homegrown AI.
The $41 Million Black Box
Sarvam AI has raised $41 million and positioned itself as India’s foundational AI effort. They unveiled a 105B parameter model at the India AI Impact Summit 2026, the summit was… eventful .
The launch post was sparse, only mentioning Indus is 105B parameters. Nvidia published this article and other press releases have this info:
MoE, 105B parameters, 9B active
32 layers, 128 experts
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