AI cooperation: On Artificial Intelligence at a crossroads
The 18th BRICS Summit, held in New Delhi on September 12-13, 2026 under India's chairmanship, adopted the New Delhi Declaration, which includes a Leaders' Statement on Global Governance of Artificial Intelligence.
The AI governance track commits member states to wider and more equitable access to AI resources, energy-efficient and trustworthy AI systems, and development priorities of the Global South.
The framework is presented as a cooperative, multilateral alternative to a purely geopolitical, great-power-competition view of AI development, in which access to compute, chips, and frontier models is treated primarily as a strategic rivalry between a small number of advanced economies.
The BRICS approach emphasises open, shared AI infrastructure and capacity-building for developing countries rather than a bloc-based race for AI dominance.
BRICS — Origin, Membership, and India's 2026 Chairmanship
BRICS began as "BRIC," a term coined by an economist to describe four large emerging economies, before evolving into a formal grouping. The first BRIC summit was held in 2009; South Africa joined the following year, making it "BRICS." The grouping has no treaty basis, no permanent secretariat, and functions through an annually rotating chairmanship, making it a forum for coordination rather than a treaty-bound international organisation.
Key Details
- Original members: Brazil, Russia, India, China (summit process began 2009); South Africa joined in 2010-11, forming BRICS.
- 2023 Johannesburg Summit invited six new members; Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, and the UAE formally joined on 1 January 2024, and Indonesia joined on 1 January 2025, taking full membership to ten countries plus a wider list of "partner countries."
- The 18th BRICS Summit (New Delhi, 12-13 September 2026) was held under India's chairmanship, with the theme "Building Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability."
- BRICS operates by consensus and has no binding enforcement mechanism; its declarations (like the New Delhi Declaration) are political commitments, not treaties.
The AI governance statement was adopted as part of the New Delhi Declaration at this summit, reflecting how India used its 2026 chairmanship to position AI as a core pillar of BRICS cooperation alongside trade and finance.
Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI) — the OECD-anchored Track
GPAI is a separate, older multilateral AI governance initiative, useful as a contrast to the BRICS approach. It shows that India participates in more than one competing (and sometimes overlapping) track of global AI governance simultaneously.
Key Details
- GPAI was launched in 2020 with 15 founding members, including India, France, Germany, Japan, the United States, and the European Union — an OECD-anchored, advanced-economy-heavy grouping.
- India hosted the GPAI Summit in New Delhi in December 2023 and held the GPAI lead chairmanship through 2024.
- GPAI's mandate is to bridge the gap between AI theory and practice through research and applied projects, rather than issuing binding rules.
- Unlike BRICS' Global-South-oriented framing, GPAI's membership skews toward developed, Western-aligned economies, though India is a founding member of both tracks.
The editorial's framing of BRICS as an "alternative to a geopolitical view of AI development" implicitly contrasts with tracks like GPAI, where advanced economies with the most compute and frontier-model capacity set much of the agenda.
India AI Impact Summit 2026 and the (Separate) New Delhi Declaration on AI Impact
India hosted two major AI-related international gatherings in 2026 that both used the name "New Delhi Declaration" — a common source of confusion, and a good candidate for an exam distractor.
Key Details
- The India AI Impact Summit was held in New Delhi (main summit dates 19-20 February 2026, with a wider programme from 16-21 February) at Bharat Mandapam — the first global AI summit hosted in the Global South.
- It adopted the "New Delhi Declaration on AI Impact" on 19 February 2026, endorsed by 89 countries and international organisations, and hosted a GPAI Council meeting at ministerial level.
- This February 2026 declaration is distinct from the September 2026 "New Delhi Declaration" adopted at the 18th BRICS Summit, which contains the Leaders' Statement on Global Governance of AI referenced in this news.
- Both declarations share Global-South-inclusive, equitable-access framing, but arise from different summits, different host formats (a dedicated global AI summit versus a BRICS multilateral summit), and different participant lists.
The BRICS AI governance statement builds on themes India had already advanced at the India AI Impact Summit earlier in 2026, showing a consistent Indian diplomatic thread across both multilateral platforms in the same year.
IndiaAI Mission — India's Domestic AI Capacity-Building Complement
While BRICS and GPAI represent India's external AI diplomacy, the IndiaAI Mission is the corresponding domestic-capacity pillar, relevant to how India can credibly champion equitable AI access abroad.
Key Details
- The Union Cabinet approved the IndiaAI Mission in March 2024 with an outlay of Rs 10,371.92 crore over five years, implemented by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) through the IndiaAI unit.
- The Mission is structured around seven pillars: compute infrastructure, innovation centres, datasets, application development, skilling, startup financing, and safe and trusted AI.
- The Union Budget 2026 allocated Rs 1,000 crore for the Mission for the fiscal year, following a Rs 2,000 crore allocation in 2025-26.
Domestic compute and dataset infrastructure built under the IndiaAI Mission underpins India's ability to advocate, credibly, for equitable AI access frameworks such as the one adopted under BRICS.
- 18th BRICS Summit: New Delhi, 12-13 September 2026, under India's chairmanship; theme "Building Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability."
- BRICS full membership (2026): 10 countries — Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Indonesia (Egypt/Ethiopia/Iran/UAE joined 1 January 2024; Indonesia joined 1 January 2025).
- GPAI: founded 2020 with 15 founding members; India held GPAI lead chairmanship in 2024.
- India AI Impact Summit: New Delhi, February 2026; New Delhi Declaration on AI Impact adopted 19 February 2026, endorsed by 89 countries.
- IndiaAI Mission: approved March 2024; outlay Rs 10,371.92 crore over five years; Budget 2026 allocation Rs 1,000 crore.