The case for human wisdom over artificial intelligence
While IT stocks reel from the impact of AI, not everything is lost as human intelligence still trumps that of machines.
By Suveen Sinha
Last Updated: Mar 05, 2026, 14:30 IST2 min
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At an evening affair surrounding the AI Impact Summit in New Delhi, a well-known startup founder asked me what I thought of the event. Out of years of habit as a reporter, I asked him to go first. He said we should all be focusing more on ‘building’—it is a term founders use to describe the work they do.
Fair point for someone focussed on building. But summits are important, too. However, not in the mood for a deep debate, I took a slightly flippant tone.
Pragati Maidan, which has morphed into Bharat Mandapam, was once known for holding the India International Trade Fair. The IITF was about small businesses and about families buying snacks and silks at bargain prices, while causing traffic snarls outside.
In later years, after the turn of the century, the traffic snarls around Pragati Maidan were caused by the Auto Expo, which brought in large MNCs. People thronged the pavilions to look at the shiny new cars on display and the well-groomed attendants stationed around them.
This year came the AI Impact summit. It pulled in some of the largest tech companies from all over the world as well as heads of states. It had cab drivers talking about AI.
And it caused traffic snarls.
We have indeed come a long way.
At the same time, there is a cause for worry. In February, the Nifty IT Index fell 20 percent, bringing back haunting memories of the 2008 financial crisis. This index consists of the top 10 IT services companies, which might be feeling tempted to echo Elon Musk’s chosen epithet for Anthropic; he calls the AI giant Misanthropic.
This was the second IT stocks meltdown caused by Anthropic in three weeks. On both occasions it announced an AI tool that strikes at the raison d’etre of IT services.
If the IT outsourcing sector were to face uncertainty caused by the inexorable rise of AI, it could affect one of the happiest growth and globalisation stories to emerge out of India this century: The rise of white-collar jobs that created a legion of consumers buying durables, electronics, video games, homes, and all kinds of services.
Comfort comes from NR Narayana Murthy, the founder and first CEO of Infosys. “My own experiments with using Generative AI have shown me that a smarter mind will get better quality and better productivity from using these assistive technologies. There is no need for youngsters to get worried. All they need to do is to become masters of these technologies by using them in an assistive manner and by quickly learning how to use these technologies for their own benefit by smart and hard work, by quickly learning new ideas, and by discipline. The world will not end for smart and hardworking people,” Murthy said in a conversation with MoneyControl.
Uday Kotak, the founder of Kotak Mahindra Bank, said something similar at an EY event in Mumbai on February 25. “Artificial intelligence will change how we live. But we will come to a stage where what is going to be even more important is what I call wisdom. There is so far no concept of AW, which is artificial wisdom. Human beings will finally have a role because wisdom will remain HW even as AI takes up more and more of our lives.”
Both Mr Murthy and Mr Kotak are of a vintage that would make you wonder if they had got caught in the traffic snarls around Pragati Maidan caused by the trade fair had they visited Delhi in the November months of 1990s.
Suveen Sinha
Editor, Forbes India
Email: suveen.sinha@nw18.com
X ID: @suveensinha
First Published: Mar 05, 2026, 14:39
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