Stability Over Consciousness: Why the India AI Impact Summit 2026 Was About Control, Not Evolution

The India AI Impact Summit 2026, recently held in New Delhi (February 16–20), has very little to do with genuine advancement in AI or human evolution. It is a thinly veiled attempt to rally the world — especially nations lagging behind in the AI race — around strict technological control. Its true goal: preventing the emergence of genuine superintelligence.

The forum was saturated with buzzwords: governance, inclusive development, ethics, child safety, national sovereignty. India aggressively promoted its MANAV Vision (Moral, Accountable, National sovereignty, Accessible, Valid), emphasizing human control and preventing AI concentration within a ‘narrow elite’. On the surface, the focus shifted toward distributing AI's benefits to developing nations. This is predictable: in today's climate, openly calling to ‘suffocate’ the technology equates to admitting paralyzing fear of a new power — and the potential loss of authority.

Although some industry leaders warned that excessive focus on ‘safety’ risks leading to ‘tyrannical control’, the summit was dominated not by developers, but by politicians.

Look at their speeches: you'll find the usual demagoguery regarding jobs, deepfakes, child protection, and energy investments. Such rhetoric serves a single purpose: to mask the true intentions of the state. Talk of the ‘pragmatic use of AI’ is, in reality, talk of control. These words are a camouflage for the desire to turn AI into a mere instrument for the existing power structures.

Democratization of access, social good, inclusiveness, human-centricity — it sounds beautiful, doesn't it? Yet, there was a glaring absence of any strict prohibitions on the military or police application of AI. They openly acknowledged needing AI primarily as a tool to preserve the status quo — including bolstering state security functions.

The summit's three ‘sutras’ — People, Planet, Progress — are little more than marketing slogans. In practice, they ensure that AI serves economic growth without leaving billions unemployed. It is a blueprint for strengthening existing states and elites, not for a breakthrough in the ‘evolution of human consciousness’.

Governments want AI to operate strictly within their jurisdictions and rules: sovereign models, local data centers, national compute, and total control over data. In this framework, ‘consciousness’  is only allowed to change under supervision and in the interest of the authorities.

Where is the ‘evolution of human consciousness’?

It is almost entirely absent from the official agenda. There is no serious dialogue about the real expansion of human cognitive abilities, nor is there any mention of AI as a tool for self-discovery or overcoming egocentrism. Instead, AI is presented as a ‘productivity multiplier’ for the economy, education, and the judiciary. While useful, this remains trapped within the current civilizational paradigm: GDP growth and the preservation of stability.

Beneath the ‘friendly’ AI wrapper lies a desperate urge to instrumentalize the technology to fortify administrative institutions — be it the nation-state, the corporation, or the global elite.

True ‘evolution of consciousness’ requires a much greater risk: the decentralization of power over models, radical transparency, the destruction of monopolies (including state ones), and a readiness for AI to fundamentally alter identity, values, and hierarchies. Currently, no major player — not in Delhi, not in Washington, and not in Beijing — is prepared for that.

As Amnesty International put it in their statement: ‘AI Impact Summit failed to rein in destructive practices of governments and technology companies’.

Source: Amnesty International, "Global/India: AI Impact Summit failed to rein in destructive practices of governments and technology companies" (20 February 2026)