AIIA-iCAINE Launches National Ayurveda AI Challenge

The All India Institute of Ayurveda (AIIA), New Delhi, held the sixth Foundation Day of its incubation centre AIIA-iCAINE on 29 October 2026. The main announcement of the day was a countrywide innovation contest that asks technologists and clinicians to build artificial intelligence tools for Ayurveda. Two memoranda of understanding were signed alongside it, a rights facility for Ayurveda inventors was opened and a workshop on entrepreneurship and design thinking was run.

AyushTech Innovate

The contest is named AyushTech Innovate: National Open Ayurveda AI Challenge. Techfest of IIT Bombay runs it together with the Ministry of Ayush and AIIA. Entries are to be built on AyurParam, the open-source Ayurveda large language model from IIT Bombay, and the brief asks for AI that is trustworthy, transparent, safe and usable in practice. The problems set before entrants cover Ayurvedic clinical work, retrieval from classical texts, research, treatment planning and public health awareness. The national grand finale will be held at IIT Bombay from 15 to 18 December 2026.

Six years of the incubator

AIIA-iCAINE was set up on 29 October 2021 under the mandate of the Ministry of Ayush and is counted as the country's first Ayurveda business incubator in the public sector. The Director of AIIA, Prof. Vd. P. K. Prajapati, told the gathering that the centre has taken up 52 problem statements, guided more than 100 startup ideas and given seed support of Rs 3 lakh each to nine startups.

The two agreements

The agreement with the World Ayurveda Foundation will set up a secretariat for artificial intelligence in Ayurveda, a shared platform for joint research, funding and CSR proposals, training programmes, hackathons and startup incubation, drawing on the Foundation's networks at home and abroad. The second, with Reliance Retail Limited under its Pahadi Local line, turns classical Ayurvedic formulations into skincare goods: the institute advises on formulation while the company handles product development, testing, manufacture and marketing.

Other launches of the day

An Intellectual Property Rights Facility for Ayurveda was opened so that innovators learn to protect what they build before it reaches a shelf. The programme also carried a briefing on the Smart India Hackathon, the launch of the Techfest Hackathon, the release of a beginners' glossary titled Ayupreneur and the handing over of grants to Smart India Hackathon 2025 winners. Masterclasses covered branding, pricing and design thinking, the last two led by Sujith Eranezhath, Chief Executive Officer of AIIA-iCAINE.