OpenAI has now launched a new OpenAI Learning Accelerator initiative in the country, targeting India's education sector. This brings free access to ChatGPT Plus for educators and students in the country.
In an official press release, OpenAI announced on August 25, 2025 the launch of its latest India-first initiative, OpenAI Learning Accelerator. This new AI drive is aimed at making ChatGPT accessible to one of the biggest markets for OpenAI, especially in the education sector.
As part of the commitment, OpenAI will provide access to ChatGPT Plus free of cost. The company with partner with the Ministry of Education (MoE), All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) and ARISE member schools to distribute these facilities over the next six months.
For context, the ChatGPT Plus plan costs Rs 1,999 per month in India. OpenAI claims that it "plans to distribute approximately half a million ChatGPT licenses to educators and students across India". This brings the value of these total benefits close to Rs 5 lakhs.
According to VP of Education, OpenAI, Leah Belsky, this is OpenAI's biggest investment to date in India's education ecosystem.
We believe AI has incredible potential to empower educators and learners. To realize that potential, we must work side by side with educators and institutions. This effort is critical to OpenAI’s mission of ensuring AGI benefits humanity—and as such, the launch of OpenAI Learning Accelerator alongside our partners, represents one of OpenAI’s most significant investments in India’s education ecosystem to date.
— Leah Belsky, VP of Education, OpenAI
Apart from access to ChatGPT Plus, OpenAI will also provide AI training to partner schools and college educators and students to "build AI literacy and confidence, ensuring the technology is used effectively and responsibly."
Additionally, OpenAI is entering into a strategic AI research collaboration with IIT Madras with a grant worth $500,000 (approximately Rs 4.5 crore). The aim of this Memorandum of Union (MoU) is to enable long-term study into "how AI can improve learning outcomes, foster innovative teaching methods, aligned to insights from cognitive neuroscience."
The research findings will be shared by the institute with OpenAI to help them build and personalise products specifically for India. Additionally, very recently, OpenAI announced the launch of its first office in India. As part of that, the company has hired India's foremost education leader Raghav Gupta as its first Head of Education for India and Asia Pacific.
There is huge potential to work closely with educators and institutions across India, and I’m thrilled to join OpenAI to lead our educational initiatives here and across the APAC region. By working closely with universities, schools, government bodies, and educators, we have an opportunity to truly transform education through AI, driving better learning outcomes, while supporting India’s ambitions to be a global leader in AI-enabled education.
— Raghav Gupta, OpenAI’s Head of Education for India and Asia Pacific
With these new initiatives, OpenAI aims to expand its presence in India, carry education campaigns across the country and expand support for more Indian regional languages to ChatGPT. Currently, the AI model can understand and converse in 11 Indian languages like Hindi, Bengali, Tamil, Marathi and so on.
That said, India is leading when it comes to AI adoption and currently houses the largest population of student users on ChatGPT and weekly active users. OpenAI also launched a new ChatGPT Go subscription tailor-made for India at an affordable price on Rs 399 per month.
