Prime Minister Narendra Modi used a special AI tool called Bhashini. It helped translate his Hindi speech into Tamil for the people who speak Tamil, so they could understand him as he spoke.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi used an AI-powered Indian language translation tool called Bhashini while giving a speech in Uttar Pradesh on Sunday. This tool instantly translated his words into another language.

The government made Bhashini, and lots of people in India added information in their own language. This helps create open language data that others can use to make tools. Reuters talked about this earlier this month.

Modi talked to people at the Kashi Tamil Sangamam in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh. He started by asking Tamil-speaking listeners to use earphones for translation before speaking to them in Hindi.

“Today, the use of new technology has taken place here through Artificial Intelligence (AI). This is a new beginning and hopefully, it makes it easier for me to reach you,” PM Modi said at the event, reported ANI.

Chatbots like OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Bard mostly understand English well and work better with languages such as French and Spanish, which also use the Roman script. Unfortunately, many languages from non-Western regions are not as well-supported in the field of AI, and efforts are being made by computer scientists to address this imbalance.

In his speech, Modi talked about Hindu history and the important things about Tamil Nadu and Varanasi. The Kashi Tamil Sangamam wants to encourage Tamil people to visit Varanasi for travel and religious journeys.

Even though it’s still tricky to smoothly translate between Indian languages using machines, Canva’s Magic Studio, powered by AI and launched in October, can translate text from English to many languages worldwide, including Hindi, Bengali, and Tamil.