Is there a way to use artificial intelligence (AI) to help raise the living standards of the poor in the country?

Manu Chopra, the co-founder of Karya Project, says yes. The Bengaluru-based company uses artificial intelligence (AI) to help rural Indians find respectable work.

Specialised AI, like large language models like Chat GPT, primarily uses the language English due to the abundance of text and audio data available.

However, Manu noticed an increasing demand for databases containing languages spoken in India like Marathi and Bengali. The Karya Project capitalises on this demand and collects and sells such data in different languages to its clients.

After covering the cost of running the platform, the profits are channelled directly into the accounts of the workers. “Let’s say that Microsoft wants to build some AI in Marathi and it asks Karya to sell 10,000 hours of audio data to them. We would break this huge task into micro tasks and distribute them among people in rural India,” he explains.

With more than three years in business, the company has worked with 32,000 rural Indians in 22 states, such as Maharastra, Karnataka, and Gujarat.

“Our workers have completed 35 million hours of paid data. We have collaborations with companies such as Microsoft and Google, foundations such as GATE and USAIG, and several state governments and academia like Stanford and IITs,” says Manu. He adds that concerning the workers on the ground, they simply have to download the Karya application and read out written sentences in their designated language.

“To encourage the workers, we pay them as soon as they come with the work. They do not have to put in a certain number of hours of work to get paid. They can simply work for a few hours in the day and get paid instantly for it,” he informs.

Manu informs that the work is designed to be so simple, that anyone can pick it up. They do not need any kind of recording space or anything to do so.

“Let’s say there is a car moving in the background, it’s no issue, or there is a cow mooing in the background, even better! The companies want the data recorded in a natural environment,” he explains.