New Delhi, June 17 -- Recently, I heard Vinod Khosla declaring how artificial intelligence (AI) will improve the quality of human life beyond belief. He noted how wonderful it would be if every person could access medical diagnoses and prescriptions at zero cost. I wondered how something that requires nearly $1 trillion of capital expenditure in a year can be available at scale at zero cost.

Then one realizes that his investments lately have been in AI. His investment in OpenAI, made when it was a non-profit, is alone worth billions. And then the penny dropped. Almost all that you hear about AI and its stupendous capabilities comes from interested parties. Companies, their managements, their investors-most of the hype comes before a fund...