India joins US-led AI alliance Pax Silica

New Delhi: India on Friday signed a declaration to join a US-led alliance Pax Silica that seeks to build a resilient supply chain for critical minerals and artificial intelligence.

Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnaw said the cooperation under Pax Silica would further deepen engagement on critical technologies and supply chain resilience under the India-US Comprehensive Global Strategic Partnership. “This will greatly benefit India’s electronics and semiconductor industry,” he said.

Secretary, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, S Krishnan and US Ambassador to India Sergio Gor and US Under Secretary of State for Economic Growth, Energy and the Environment Jacob Helberg signed the agreement at an event held on the margins of the AI Impact Summit.

The Pax Silica alliance was launched in December 2025 at a summit in Washington, with partner nations including Australia, Greece, Israel, Japan, Qatar, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates and the United Kingdom.

The stated objective of the initiative is to reduce dependencies in the technology supply chain and shape how the AI economy is built. The alliance is seen as a counter to China’s dominance in rare earths.

Last month, Gor invited India to join the Pax Silica alliance. Though India was not a part of the summit in Washington, New Delhi joined the alliance barely two months after its formation.

“Pax Silica is the coalition that will define the 21st century economic and technological order,” said Gor, adding that the alliance is “designed to secure the entire silicon stack, from the mines where we extract critical minerals, to the fabs where we manufacture chips, to the data centres where we deploy frontier AI”.

The term “Pax” is a Latin word for peace. “Silica” refers to the mineral that forms the fundamental building block of computer chips and AI systems.

“Today, as we sign the Pax Silica declaration, we say no to weaponised dependency, and we say no to blackmail. Together, we affirm that economic security is national security,” said Helberg, alluding to China’s dominance in the sector. China dominates mining and processing of critical minerals with market share in excess of 70%.

“India’s joining the Pax Silica initiative marks a significant step forward in deepening bilateral collaboration in critical and emerging technologies and reinforces the shared commitment of both countries to resilient, trusted and future-ready supply chains,” the Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement.

The development comes weeks after the two countries announced the conclusion of a trade deal to reduce tariff and non-tariff barriers.

Ambassador Gor said the India-US trade deal would be signed very soon. “In fact, even this week, we have both teams talking to each other and actively getting to a place where both will be able to sign,” he said.

“We are thrilled that the interim deal is done. You have a few tweaking points that are left to do, but it’s done. So the signing will happen sooner than later,” Gor added.