Institutional Memory Must Guide Use of AI in Legislatures: Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairman Harivansh

Highlighting the risks of unchecked technological adoption, Shri Harivansh stressed the need for human oversight and the ability to intervene at all stages of AI deployment.

 

Deputy Chairman of the Rajya Sabha, Shri Harivansh, underscored the critical importance of human institutional memory in shaping the application of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in legislatures, cautioning that technology must remain accountable, contextual and firmly rooted in democratic values.

He made these remarks while addressing a workshop on the adoption of AI in Parliament during the 28th Conference of Speakers and Presiding Officers of the Commonwealth (CSPOC), currently underway in New Delhi.

AI Must Be Accountable, Contextual and Trustworthy

Emphasising a hybrid approach to AI development, Shri Harivansh observed that while skills can be transferred or outsourced, institutional knowledge is deeply embedded within organisations and evolves over time.

“When a human enters a new organisation, they bring with them two essential attributes: skill and knowledge. Skills can be acquired, transferred, or outsourced. Knowledge, however, is contextual and deeply embedded within the institution,” he said.

He noted that parliamentary knowledge is unique, shaped over decades through debates, rulings, conventions and constitutional practices. The same principle, he stressed, must apply to artificial intelligence if it is to function effectively within legislative institutions.

“Institutional knowledge of humans is central to developing accountable AI for Parliaments,” he added.

Human Oversight Essential for Democratic AI

Highlighting the risks of unchecked technological adoption, Shri Harivansh stressed the need for human oversight and the ability to intervene at all stages of AI deployment.

“Innovation without restraint carries risk, while restraint without innovation can lead to stagnation. Parliament must maintain a careful and deliberate balance between the two,” he said.

He cautioned that AI systems used in legislative contexts must not operate autonomously or without ethical boundaries, reiterating that human judgment must remain supreme.

AI Tools Already Supporting Parliamentary Work

Outlining practical applications of AI already being deployed in the Indian Parliament, Shri Harivansh cited the use of AI models for:

• Translation of parliamentary business documents

• Analysis of parliamentary debates

• Framing of parliamentary questions

• Multilingual processing across 22 Indian languages

He highlighted the development of a Parliamentary Language Dictionary containing approximately 48,000 terms, which has been integrated into a custom AI model designed exclusively for parliamentary use.

“This has significantly increased acceptability among internal users and improved its accuracy. Human translators remain firmly in control, with AI serving as an assistive tool,” he said.

However, he made it clear that AI in Parliament must be rooted in truth, bound by ethics, guided by human judgment, and accountable to democratic values.

Call for Commonwealth Parliamentary Cooperation

In his concluding remarks, Shri Harivansh called for greater cooperation among Commonwealth legislatures in sharing experiences, best practices and ethical frameworks for AI adoption in parliamentary functioning.

The two-day CSPOC conference, being hosted by India for the fourth time—after previous editions in 1971, 1986 and 2010—was inaugurated earlier by Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi at the Central Hall of Parliament (Samvidhan Sadan).