Policy Report and Developers’ Toolkit on Voice Technologies

On 20th February 2026, India launched a Policy Report and Developers’ Toolkit to promote open, inclusive and responsible voice technologies at the India AI Summit Expo 2026.

Key Points

Voice-First Digital Push: The initiative aims to accelerate adoption of speech-based digital services to expand access to public services and the digital economy in a linguistically diverse country.
Framework For Responsible Speech AI: The Policy Report analyses barriers across the voice-technology lifecycle, including data governance, model development, infrastructure and safeguards, and recommends treating foundational speech datasets as digital public goods.
Developers’ Toolkit Guidance: The Toolkit provides practical, lifecycle-oriented approaches for building inclusive and robust speech AI systems, addressing challenges such as uneven data representation, weak evaluation practices and fragmented governance.
Focus on Inclusion: Voice technologies are positioned as a critical layer of digital public infrastructure, enabling access for users with limited literacy or digital familiarity through multilingual speech interfaces.
Safeguards and Openness: The framework emphasises model openness, representativeness, quality assurance and safeguards against misuse while enabling innovation.
Strengthening BHASHINI Ecosystem: The report and toolkit complement BHASHINI’s expanding efforts to build AI-powered multilingual translation and voice solutions that bridge linguistic and digital divides.