In February 2026, just over a week before India hosted the AI Impact Summit, New Delhi announced that it had signed digital public infrastructure (DPI) cooperation agreements with 23 countries. Amid bipolar geopolitical contests, India’s DPI diplomacy can be viewed as extending infrastructural soft power internationally.
India’s DPI, known as India Stack, comprises digital identity, digital payment, service delivery platforms and data governance and exchange. It supports several mobile apps for public service delivery, including DigiLocker for official documents and DigiYatra for air travel.
The success of these efforts has encouraged India to pursue ‘DPI diplomacy’ since its G20 presidency. This model has attracted interest in international development circles and across the Global South. As competition between the United States and China extends to critical minerals and the raw materials needed for digital and energy infrastructure, growing interest in DPI is timely. Countries seeking to build digital rails for public administration are increasingly concerned about digital sovereignty, and DPI seems to offer a suitable solution. Attention is also turning to developing AI capabilities using the building blocks that DPI provides.
