Call for Partnerships: Just AI Awards 2025
Empowering Ethical AI Through a Multistakeholder and Multisectoral Approach
About Just AI Awards 2025
Honoring India’s Changemakers: Ethical AI-Solutions for Social Good
Conceptualized by: Digital Empowerment Foundation (DEF)
In Partnership With: Emerging Technologies Wing, Government of Telangana
The Just AI Awards is India’s foremost platform dedicated to recognizing AI-driven innovations that promote social good, bridge digital and social divides, and advance ethical and inclusive AI practices. Established by the Digital Empowerment Foundation, the awards celebrate projects, initiatives, and solutions that approach AI as a tool for positive change across diverse sectors.
Mandate of the Just AI Awards:
The Just AI Awards is committed to recognizing the top three best practices in India that have leveraged Artificial Intelligence to build impactful projects at the grassroots level. These projects should demonstrate significant contributions toward breaking social and digital barriers, reducing socio-economic inequalities, strengthening crisis response, and upholding the democratic and feminist principles of the internet. In addition to this scope, the awards will place special emphasis on AI solutions that:
– Prioritize ethical data collection through participatory development methods
– Promote gender justice and inclusivity
– Decolonize the internet by supporting linguistic diversity
– Ensure universal and affordable internet access
In an era marked by rapid advances in emerging technologies, the Just AI Awards seeks to uplift projects that engage AI as a tool for social good, addressing critical questions related to ethical data use, privacy, algorithmic biases, and the complexities arising from unregulated datasets.
Looking Ahead to 2025:
The Just AI Awards 2025 will continue its mission by identifying and honoring exceptional AI initiatives across India. With a focus on accessible, affordable, and accountable AI, the awards aim to showcase impactful models that address ethical issues in task automation and algorithmic fairness and promote a citizen-centric approach. We are seeking partnerships with industry leaders, academic institutions, government bodies, non-profits, media, and community-based organizations committed to advancing AI for social impact.
2024 Highlights:
In 2024, the Just AI Awards partnered with leading organizations such as T-Hub, World Summit Awards (WSA), MXR World, Commons Collective, and MediaNama as the Media Partner, highlighting a shared commitment to responsible AI. This collaboration reinforced the awards’ vision of fostering AI solutions for a more inclusive and equitable society.
The award ceremony, held at Novotel HICC, Hyderabad, recognized three exceptional winners and four best AI practices, selected after a thorough evaluation by a distinguished jury.
The jury members included Ms. Rama Devi Lanka, Director at the Emerging Technologies Wing, Government of Telangana; Ms. Aditi Namdeo, Director at J-PAL South Asia; Ms. Urvashi Aneja, Founding Director of Digital Futures Lab; Mr. Dushyant Arora, Founder of Preamble Advisors; Mr. Nikhil Pahwa, Founder of MediaNama; Ms. Smita Gupta, Curator of Agami; Mr. Siddhartha Malempati, from Commons Collective; Ms. Piya Bahadur, CEO of Peabody Soft; and Mr. Anivar Aravind, Head of Engineering at FoodHub.
The awardees included SignAssistive AI, which bridges the communication gap for 63 million deaf and hard of hearing individuals by translating vernacular content into Indian Sign Language; Shhor AI, a groundbreaking content moderation tool created by a queer Adivasi neurodivergent engineer to combat hate speech in code-mixed languages; and SACH AI Chatbot by Factly, an AI-powered tool that combats misinformation through real-time fact-checking. Additionally, the best AI practices recognized included FarmGpt, AI Planet for Education, Bandhu Bot, and Civis, all of which contribute to social good, promoting ethical AI, reducing socio-economic inequalities, and ensuring inclusive digital access. The Just AI Awards continue to highlight AI’s transformative potential to solve pressing societal issues through ethical, innovative, and participatory approaches.
Contact Person:
Dr. Arpita Kanjilal
Lead, Just AI Awards
Digital Empowerment Foundation
arpita@defindia.org / justaiawards@gmail.com
To explore partnership opportunities, please access the form using the QR code below:
