By TIOL News Service

NEW DELHI, MAR 22, 2025: IN a significant move to enhance disaster resilience and emergency communication, Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT), the Telecom R&D centre of the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), Government of India, has signed an agreement with Indian Institute of Technology Delhi (IIT Delhi) for the development of a "Generative AI-Enhanced Chatbot for Customer Support in Disaster Early Warning and Emergency Communication".

This initiative aligns with the broader vision of enabling automated and reliable communication services and strengthening India's disaster preparedness infrastructure.

The AI-powered chatbot will provide real-time multilingual assistance to disaster managers, first responders, and affected communities by leveraging advanced Natural Language Processing (NLP), Text-to-Speech (TTS), Speech-to-Text (STT), and Image Processing techniques. It will integrate with 3GPP-compliant emergency communication protocols to ensure seamless coordination during crises. Additionally, the solution will be fully on-premise, ensuring cybersecurity compliance, data privacy, and high availability for mission-critical applications. The solution will be integrated with the existing Disaster Management System of NDMA developed by C-DOT to enhance the capability of the platform.

The agreement was signed under the C-DOT Collaborative Research Program (CCRP) during a ceremony attended by Dr. Rajkumar Upadhyay, CEO, C-DOT, Shikha Srivastava, EVP-II, C-DOT, Prof. Brejesh Lall, Principal Investigator from IIT Delhi, and Col. (Dr.) Amit Oberoi from Carnot Research Pvt. Ltd., the implementation partner of IIT Delhi.

Dr. Rajkumar Upadhyay, CEO, C-DOT, emphasized the importance of indigenous innovation in disaster communication technologies, highlighting how AI-powered solutions can address India's diverse and complex emergency response needs. He reiterated C-DOT's commitment to developing secure, scalable, and India-specific telecom solutions, reinforcing the vision of 'Atmanirbhar Bharat' in critical communication infrastructure.

Speaking on the occasion, Prof. Lall highlighted the transformative potential of AI-driven disaster communication, emphasizing the importance of real-time, secure, and multilingual support in crisis situations.

Representatives from C-DOT reaffirmed their commitment to this collaboration. By integrating AI-driven decision support systems, emergency call routing, and multilingual voice recognition, this initiative is set to revolutionize disaster response in India, ensuring faster, smarter, and more efficient communication during emergencies.