Should TG, AP need to invest in their intangible assets?

Hyderabad: KS Murthy, an IT expert working with a US firm, expressed the Telugu states should have thought of an out-of-the-box solution. Of the 700 languages identified spoken in India and 22 official languages of the country, Telugu is the speaking population of AP and Telangana and is ranked fourth in the 2011 census. Telugu is among the fastest-growing languages in the United States, as per the reports from the US Census Bureau. The Telugu-speaking diaspora of about 12 lakh are concentrated in California, Texas and New Jersey. Considering the Telugu-speaking population of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, and other parts of the country, even other countries, their population touches a little over 10 crore. “Even 1/4 of the linguistic sampling creates a huge asset and impact with the development of AI-enabled Telugu language applications”, he says.

K Jyostna, an AI specialist from Ananthapur working in an IT firm in Bengaluru, says Kannada is the sister language of Telugu. Further amplification and replication of it have huge job creation potential, with a common thread of IT and Telugu and Kannada connecting all three states.

Rather than fighting over differences, the two states should invest funds in their strengths – the two states should focus on creating common intellectual capital assets like AI-enabled Telugu language technology application development centres. Commercial exploitation and the development of language-based technological applications give more dividends than what the interest banks can offer.

“Moreover, such initiatives help offer widespread AI-enabled government and other services in Telugu to the people of both states, the Telugu-speaking diaspora in the country and abroad. It allows the creation of new jobs and services in G2C (Government to Citizen) and P2P (People to People), she adds. Besides, the Telugu language and culture remain relevant and contemporary in a newly emerging technological landscape.