At UNESCO’s AI Consultations, a Grassroots Youth Leader Pushes for Inclusion

Growing up, he watched talented peers quietly exit education into factory work, not for lack of ability, but because opportunity never reached them. What struck him wasn't the loss itself, but how silently it happened.

“Sometimes exclusion begins long before people realize they are excluded," he said. "If a child pushed by poverty turns toward labour, society calls it unfortunate. If the same child turns toward crime, society calls him criminal. But very few ask what kind of exclusion pushed him there."

Now in his early twenties, he carries that question with him as he thinks about the future of artificial intelligence.

UNESCO, in partnership with the IndiaAI Mission and Ikigai Law, and supported by the Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, launched the India AI Readiness Assessment Report at the India AI Impact Summit 2026 on 16 February in New Delhi. The report maps both India's strengths and the possibilities ahead: the country accounts for 16% of global AI talent and has filed over 86,000 AI patents since 2010, with notable progress in multilingual AI and digital public service delivery. It also identifies areas of improvement, such as the need for a comprehensive legal gap analysis to better assess risks, and more inclusive AI transition planning to prevent widening inequalities, particularly in the informal sector.

For Aman, that framing is precisely the point. He sees a direct line between the information gaps he witnessed growing up and the governance gaps that could define the AI era.

"If policies are designed without listening to communities," he said, "technology can reproduce the same inequalities that already exist."