Nirmala Sitharaman urges AIIB to widen financing toward AI, MSMEs and skilling infrastructure

The Economic Times reports that Nirmala Sitharaman met AIIB President Zou Jiayi on the sidelines of the bank’s annual meeting. She congratulated the lender on its strong first-half performance, pledged India’s support for its 2027 budget plans and operational scale-up, and urged it to widen its financing focus toward AI, micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), and skilling infrastructure. India is AIIB’s second-largest shareholder after China.