Ahead of 2027 In Uttar Pradesh elections, artificial intelligence has entered political campaigning in ways that expose a clear difference in approach. Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav has publicly screened AI-generated videos at press conferences that mock Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, including depictions of him smoking a chillum and other satirical or demeaning portrayals. Party platforms and affiliated accounts have circulated similar synthetic content. Yadav has at times distanced the party from originating specific clips while still playing them and promising responses in kind. This open promotion by the leadership normalises the use of generative tools for personal ridicule rather than substantive debate. Political mockery is not new, but the ease and realism of AI make such material more potent, harder to dismiss as mere cartoon, and capable of blurring the line between satire and fabricated personal attack.
Opinion: When AI Becomes A Political Weapon - Akhilesh Yadav And The New Low In Political Discourse | Amitabh Satyam
Amitabh Satyam contrasts UP political AI use: SP's Akhilesh Yadav weaponises generative tools for ridicule, while Yogi Adityanath's governance and BJP focus on responsible assistance.
From Backroom Tactics To Open Political Weaponry
Parties have long used indirect channels for personal attacks. What has changed is the conspicuousness. When the principal Opposition leader himself presents AI videos targeting the sitting Chief Minister – who also holds a religious office as head of the Gorakhnath peeth – the act legitimises the medium for demeaning opponents. Questions about acceptable conduct become harder to avoid. If leadership treats such content as fair game, the incentive for further escalation grows. Both sides have traded allegations of originating derogatory clips, yet the public screening by Akhilesh Yadav has drawn particular attention for crossing into open endorsement. The result is a coarser discourse in which technology is deployed less to inform voters than to entertain supporters and discredit rivals.
Yogi Adityanath’s Contrasting Framework: AI As An Assistant, Not A Decision-maker
In contrast, the Uttar Pradesh government under Yogi Adityanath has articulated and begun implementing a different stance. In October 2026 the Cabinet approved the Uttar Pradesh AI Mission (UP-AIM) to promote safe, effective and responsible use of artificial intelligence in governance and citizen services. The mission aims to develop or implement more than 100 AI use cases (with 25–30 to be scaled), support at least 100 AI startups, train five lakh AI-fluent youth, and prepare 50,000 forward-deployed AI professionals. It includes an integrated-UP AI stack with a data ecosystem, secure exchange, and GPU computing, plus AI centres of excellence and district-level AI Kendras across all 75 districts. An AI Trust and Assurance Framework is planned, emphasising security, privacy, risk assessment, pre-deployment evaluation, and human oversight for high-impact systems.
CM Yogi Adityanath has repeatedly stressed that AI should assist human intelligence and judgement, not replace them. At the TechSangam 2026 conference, he warned that complete dependence on the technology could itself become a crisis and that criminals attempting to hide behind AI or deepfakes would still be tracked through forensic and scientific methods. The state is positioning AI for practical public benefit: early breast-cancer screening, digital health records, predictive tools in hospitals, assistance in secondary examinations and teacher training, fraud detection in direct benefit transfers, and efficiency gains in administrative processes. The goal is to help citizens with minor complications – faster diagnosis, better scheme monitoring, reduced office-to-office runaround – while preserving human decision-making in sensitive domains. Training programmes and district centres are intended to build understanding of both capabilities and limitations so that AI supplements talent rather than substitutes for the effort of real expertise.
The Difference In Purpose
The contrast is not merely between two leaders but between two conceptions of technology’s purpose. Akhilesh Yadav’s public screening of AI-generated videos that caricature Yogi Adityanath and other opponents treats generative tools as instruments of personal mockery and rapid political attack, lowering the standard of discourse while remaining largely indifferent to the substance of policy or the responsible boundaries of the medium. The Bharatiya Janata Party, by comparison, has directed its organisational effort toward structured capacity-building. Under the Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya training programmes and the Digital Learning Platform launched on its foundation day, the party is equipping Karyakartas with practical knowledge of AI tools, their limitations, and the precautions required so that synthetic content is not casually misused. That platform functions as an accessible knowledge resource – video modules, assessments, and curated materials – available to workers across districts, including those with fewer privileges of formal education or urban connectivity. While the Samajwadi Party has chosen open endorsement of ridicule, the BJP’s approach has been to treat AI as a means of disciplined organisational learning and of widening access to structured information, aligning the party’s internal use with the same principle of responsible assistance rather than replacement that the Yogi government has articulated for public administration. The difference is visible in practice: one side weaponises the technology against opponents; the other invests in teaching its own workers how to use it without abandoning human judgement or the obligation to inform rather than merely provoke.
About the Author: Amitabh Satyam is an alumnus of IIT Kanpur and the Fisher College of Business, with extensive leadership experience at global organizations including Shearson Lehman Brothers, CableVision, IBM, Reliance, SAP, and Siemens. A seasoned corporate leader and technology strategist, his work focuses on enterprise digital transformation, corporate management, and advanced technology applications.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the publisher. While every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of the information, the publisher is not responsible for any errors or omissions, or for the results obtained from the use of this information.