RBI sets up panel to develop a framework on ethical use of AI in financial sector

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has announced that it has constituted a committee to develop a Framework for Responsible and Ethical Enablement of Artificial Intelligence (FREE-AI) in the Financial Sector. An announcement on this was first made on December 6 along with the monetary policy announcement.

The committee will be led by Pushpak Bhattacharyya, Professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, IIT Bombay as chairman. 

The members include Debjani Ghosh, Distinguished Fellow, NITI Aayog, Independent Director, Reserve Bank Innovation Hub, and Ex-President, NASSCOM; Balaraman Ravindran, Professor and Head, Wadhwani School of Data Science and AI, IIT Madras; Abhishek Singh, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Government of India; Rahul Matthan, Partner, Trilegal; Anjani Rathor, Group Head and Chief Digital Experience Officer, HDFC Bank Ltd; Sree Hari Nagaralu, Head of Security AI Research, Microsoft India (R&D). Suvendu Pati, CGM, FinTech Department, Reserve Bank of India has been named as member secretary. 

The Committee will assess the current level of adoption of AI in financial services, globally and in India, review regulatory and supervisory approaches on AI with focus on financial sector globally and identify potential risks associated with AI, if any and recommend an evaluation, mitigation and monitoring framework and consequent compliance requirements for financial institutions, including banks, NBFCs, FinTechs, PSOs, etc.

It will also recommend a framework including governance aspects for responsible, ethical adoption of AI models / applications in the Indian financial sector and any other matter related to AI in the Indian financial sector.

The Committee will submit its report within six months from the date of its first meeting.

FinTech Department, Central Office, Reserve Bank of India will provide the secretarial support to the Committee.