Muskan Bhatia
New Delhi, Feb 20 (.) Robotics, which has become a household name in the age of artificial intelligence (AI), barely made it into the news or entered people’s living rooms in India at the start of this century.
Fast forward to 2026. After years of exposure to vacuum bots and drone technologies, children today casually discuss automating chores at home. In some households, cleaning a play area is no longer just a task; it is a design challenge.
The imagination of young minds is expanding. Many want to build their own robots, envisioning use cases from smart assistants to farm helpers. In a country still strengthening its hardware ecosystem, a quiet generation of early hardware entrepreneurs is taking shape.
At the ongoing India AI Impact Summit at Madhya Pradesh’s state Pavilion at New Delhi, a humanoid robot built by Class 9 students drew curious crowds. Fully 3D-printed by the students, the robot detects humans, waves, makes gestures, moves its eyes and responds in real time using integrated OpenAI tools.
“If we place it in a noiseless area, our robot, through its integrated speakers and microphone, can record your speech and respond in real time using the OpenAI system integrated into it,” explained the mentor, elaborating on the speech capabilities of the bot created by students at his centre.
Behind such projects is Mudit Thakkar, founder of Youngovator, who has been working in robotics since 2011. Dubbed the “Robot Man of India”, a title he shared, given by Nitin Gadkari, Minister of Road and Transport, Thakkar began his journey in Indore with a small team and a handful of students. Over 14 years, across ventures including Edu Square and now Youngovator, he says he has trained nearly 25,000 children, 12,000 of them since 2021 alone.
What began as workshops has expanded into structured labs operating in Indore, Chandigarh and Rajkot, while partnering with government and private schools. His head office houses a 22-member core team, supported by 40 trainers delivering programmes across centres and schools.
Thakkar’s model goes beyond assembling kits. Students are introduced to robotics, drones, 3D printing and app development before applying what he calls “design thinking” to solve real-world problems. The journey, he says, typically lasts a year. In that time, some students move from curiosity to entrepreneurship. Over the past year, more than eight school students, from Classes 7 to 9, have registered private limited companies with mentorship from his team.
But the path is not without challenges. “In robotics, there is a tendency to build two or three projects and call oneself an engineer,” he says. “Innovation is a long-term journey. Parents need to understand that curiosity must be nurtured with patience.”
He argues that while India has a growing pool of AI software talent, the hardware workforce remains thin. “Many will showcase AI applications. But who will prepare the workforce that integrates hardware with software?” he asked. “If we combine both, we position ourselves strongly for the future.”
Balancing a humanoid robot, for instance, demands an understanding of inertia, weight transfer and structural design, lessons drawn straight from physics textbooks into workshop floors. “Through our R&D, we learn and then transfer that knowledge to students,” Thakkar added.
As India looks to develop indigenous AI solutions tailored to its own challenges, classrooms like these may prove critical. What began as tinkering with motors and microcontrollers is evolving into something larger: a generation that does not just consume technology, but builds it , bolt by bolt, line by line.
. MBJ RSA
