Nasscom, India’s non-profit trade association, today launched its latest report titled “The State of AI-Native Talent in India: Decoding the Readiness of India’s Early-Career Technology Workforce”. The report introduced the Nasscom AI-Native Talent Index, which is a structured industry benchmark to assess AI-native capability. The inaugural edition focuses on early-career tech talent, defined as tech workforce with up to 3 years’ experience, including final year Computer Science (and related fields) engineering students.According to the study, nearly 70 per cent of India’s early-career technology talent is AI-proficient, while approximately 23 per cent qualifies as AI-native. The data reflects a young population that is increasingly integrating AI into their work, learning and decision-making. At the same time, it highlights significant headroom to deepen India’s AI-native talent base by strengthening engineering judgment, AI orchestration skills and technical depth.The index is based on a multidimensional framework that measures AI-native capability across eleven dimensions covering AI reliance, fluency, orchestration and creation, as well as AI judgment, cognitive independence, technical grounding, learning, foundational capability, AI-augmented productivity and responsible AI use. Based on the score, individuals are classified into four archetypes: AI-Native, AI Proficient, AI-Enabled and AI-Aware.The study points out that while AI is demonstrably improving productivity, learning speed and capability, organizations and educational institutions will need to deliberately recreate opportunities for engineers to build deep technical understanding, orchestration skills and independent judgment that were previously developed through hands-on experience.Sangeeta Gupta, Senior Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer, Nasscom, said: “India is uniquely positioned to emerge as a global hub for AI-native technology talent. It is important to keep in mind that AI skills penetration is not the same as being AI-native.”According to the study, for the industry to move towards an AI-Native workforce, organizations will need to rethink long-established operating models. Hiring assessments for organisations will need to shift from testing coding knowledge to evaluating AI-native capabilities. Capability building will need to include AI-augmented foundational learning, simulation-based learning, structured AI-off exercises, judgment-building experiences and multi-layered mentorship.Published on July 14, 2026