The IndiaAI foundation models Eka-1, Dhīr 2B and Dhīr 5B were launched under the IndiaAI Mission, with the Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) announcing them on Tuesday, according to Asianet News’s report dated 4 November 2026. Eka-1 is built by Soket Labs and the two Dhīr models by ZenteiQ.
Open Source For You, which also reported on 4 November 2026, says Eka-1 has about 26 billion parameters and was trained on about 7.5 trillion tokens. It supports the 22 scheduled Indian languages and English.
What are Eka-1, Dhīr 2B and Dhīr 5B?
Eka-1 is aimed at mathematics, coding, reasoning and AI agent tasks. It can run on private servers, private cloud systems and offline environments, and Asianet reports that its data preparation, training and evaluation were done entirely in India. Model weights are planned for public release within a month, with initial access through a waitlist.
Dhīr 2B and Dhīr 5B are compact models for document automation, information retrieval and knowledge services. They can run on mobile phones without an internet connection, and their weights are already available through AIKosh. ZenteiQ plans a free Android and iOS app, and a 9-billion-parameter model is planned for December for researchers and engineers.
What it means for Indian businesses
The models are meant for air-gapped settings, where sensitive data cannot leave a secure network, such as government, defence and private-sector work. Soket Labs CEO Abhishek Upperwal said: “We want to remove the reliance of foreign models.” Offline operation could also help firms that cannot send data to external cloud services.
Industry Reaction and Expert Commentary
MeitY Secretary S. Krishnan called the public availability of the models an “important milestone” in developing India’s AI capabilities, as reported by Open Source For You. ZenteiQ founder Prof. Sashikumaar Ganesan explained that once the model is downloaded, “all the configuration automatically takes place.” No independent benchmark comparisons were found in the sources reviewed.
What Happens Next?
Eka-1 weights are expected within a month, and ZenteiQ’s 9-billion-parameter model is planned for December, according to Asianet News.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who built the new IndiaAI models?
Soket Labs built Eka-1, and ZenteiQ built Dhīr 2B and Dhīr 5B.
Can the models run offline?
Yes. Eka-1 can run on private servers and offline environments, and the Dhīr models can run on phones without internet.
Where can the Dhīr model weights be downloaded?
Asianet News reports that the Dhīr weights are available through AIKosh.
Source: Asianet News (4 November 2026) and Open Source For You (4 November 2026).
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