Kanishka Narayan becomes the UK's first AI minister
London: The UK’s new Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, has appointed the first AI minister of the UK. Bihar-born Kanishka Narayan has become the first dedicated minister for Artificial Intelligence, elevating the role to Cabinet level as part of a wider government reshuffle set in motion by Andy Burnham.
Narayan was earlier the minister for online safety and AI, and now he will serve jointly in the Cabinet Office and the Department for Business and Trade. As per media reports and the UK’s Prime Minister’s office, he will also attend Cabinet meetings, underlining the government’s decision to give AI a bigger role in policymaking.
Narayan’s appointment is announced after Burnham officially took office on Monday after meeting King Charles III at Buckingham Palace.
Kanishka Narayan was born in Muzaffarpur in Bihar. He spent his early childhood in Bihar, and then he moved to Delhi and later to Cardiff at the age of 12. Narayan studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at the University of Oxford, and then he did his MBA from Stanford University.
According to the BBC, Narayana has worked in several roles in the private and public sector. In the 2024 general election, which saw a Labour government come to power for the first time since 2010, Narayan made history by becoming Wales’ first ethnic minority MP after winning the Vale of Glamorgan constituency.
Narayan joined the government in September 2025 after the then PM appointed him as minister of AI and online safety.
Narayan’s appointment as the AI minister reflects the growing importance of the subject in Britain’s economic and industrial agenda. UK is the home of several tech and AI companies, including DeepMind, Google. Wayve, and ElevenLabs, and the government is also gearing up for several major digital infrastructure project consisting of a planned OpenAI-backed data centre.
