MeitY Unveils DEPA Handbook for Trusted Data Sharing in AI

India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has released a handbook on the Data Empowerment and Protection Architecture (DEPA), aimed at enabling trusted data sharing for artificial intelligence training.

According to the ministry, the handbook outlines a techno-legal framework. It allows institutions to collaborate on data for AI training while retaining control over their own data, rather than handing it over unconditionally.

Why it matters

Access to good-quality data is one of the main constraints on building AI models. Organisations that hold valuable datasets are often reluctant to share them because of privacy, legal and competitive concerns. A framework that combines technical safeguards with legal rules is meant to address that hesitation and make collaboration more practical.

For startups, researchers and enterprises working on AI, a clear, government-backed approach to data collaboration could lower the barriers to training models on datasets that would otherwise stay siloed.

What comes next

The handbook sets out the framework, but the material provided does not detail adoption timelines or specific pilot programmes. How widely institutions take up the approach, and how it is applied in practice, will determine its impact on India's AI ecosystem.