India, Feb. 24 -- Digital-first is no longer a meaningful aspiration. The institutions that will shape India's future are not merely digitising processes. They are reorganising themselves fundamentally around artificial intelligence (AI).

By the time one finishes reading this paragraph, an AI system somewhere has graded an assignment, identified a student who may be struggling, optimised a timetable, and assisted in drafting a research abstract. The central question for India's more than 1,000 universities and tens of thousands of colleges is not whether AI will alter higher education. The real question is whether institutions will lead this shift or be overtaken by it.

A decade ago, universities across India invested heavily in becomin...