India's Workers Are Training AI Robots to Take Their Jobs - The Rise of Spatial AI and Egocentric Data in Tamil Nadu

Thousands of Indian workers - many of them housewives, factory hands, and informal labourers - are being paid to film their everyday tasks using head-mounted cameras and smartphones, generating the training data that global tech companies need to build AI-powered humanoid robots. The work pays around 250 rupees (approximately two dollars) per hour and is currently providing short-term employment in states like Tamil Nadu, even as experts warn the technology being trained could one day eliminate similar jobs entirely.

Quick Facts

  • Date of Report: June 11, 2026 (AFP / Dawn, Al Jazeera, Digital Journal)
  • Key Company: Objectways, an AI data firm with offices in India and the United States, headquartered in Tamil Nadu's Karur district
  • Pay Rate: Approximately 250 rupees (around two US dollars) per hour of video recorded
  • Technique: Workers record first-person footage called "egocentric data" using head-mounted cameras, smart glasses, and motion sensors
  • Market Forecast: Morgan Stanley projects over one billion humanoid robots could be in use worldwide by 2050, primarily for industrial and commercial purposes
  • India's Informal Workforce: Government think-tank NITI Aayog has noted that India has approximately 490 million informal workers
  • AI Unicorns in 2026: Artificial intelligence companies account for 25 of the 98 startups that reached unicorn status in 2026, according to Digital Journal reporting
  • Platform Used: Objectways works with Amazon SageMaker, a machine learning model platform, and counts Fortune 500 multinationals among its clients

What Happened?

An AFP investigation published on June 11, 2026 documented how thousands of Indian workers - from housewives in Chennai to factory workers in Tamil Nadu's Karur district - are earning income by recording themselves performing everyday tasks. These recordings, captured through smartphones, GoPro cameras, RGB cameras, and smart glasses strapped to their heads, form part of a growing pipeline of so-called "egocentric data" used to train AI systems and humanoid robots.

The AI data company Objectways, which operates out of Karur in Tamil Nadu and maintains offices in the United States, is among the firms driving this activity. Its CEO, Ravi Shankar, who grew up in Tamil Nadu, employs local workers to generate training videos of activities such as folding towels, making sandwiches, cooking, and performing coffee-making routines. At the company's studio facilities, workers film themselves in mock furnished apartments, changing positions and wallpapers after several thousand hours to provide variety for clients. Workers can record approximately 90 short video clips - each lasting around four minutes - per day.

Bengaluru-based Humyn Labs, a separate and unrelated company, is also active in this space. Its founder Manish Agarwal records conversations in addition to videos, with contributors discussing topics ranging from politics to entertainment to train AI in processing speech patterns.

The broader context is the rapid growth of the humanoid robotics sector. Investment bank Morgan Stanley has projected that more than one billion humanoid robots could be operating globally by 2050, mostly in industrial and commercial applications. This has intensified demand for physical AI training data - the kind that Indian workers are now generating at scale.

Key Facts

  • Nagireddy Sriramyachandra, a 25-year-old housewife from Chennai, Tamil Nadu, earns approximately 250 rupees per hour filming herself performing kitchen tasks such as slicing mangoes for AI training purposes.
  • Objectways operates recording studios in Karur, Tamil Nadu, with mock furnished rooms designed specifically for AI training footage; wallpaper is changed periodically after thousands of hours of filming to create variety.
  • At a Karur textile factory, AFP journalists directly observed eight workers wearing head cameras and smart glasses provided by Objectways while performing routine production tasks.
  • Digital labour expert Aditi Surie from the Indian Institute for Human Settlements in Bengaluru stated it is likely that AI data collection services will increase over time.
  • Humyn Labs founder Manish Agarwal believes humans and robots will eventually work together rather than robots replacing humans, citing a scenario where a welder in India could remotely manage a welder-robot operating in Prague.
  • Government think-tank NITI Aayog has published a report warning that discussions about AI and labour tend to focus on white-collar workers, neglecting India's approximately 490 million informal workers.
  • NITI Aayog's report, released ahead of a global AI summit in India in 2026, examined the potential impact of AI on dozens of professions, from cobblers and sewer cleaners to farmers and tea sellers.
  • A 55-year-old flower garland maker known as Ponni, who works roadside in Bengaluru, has also participated in AI data recording, expressing concern that the next generation doing similar work "will face a problem."

Why It Matters

The story captures a fundamental and uncomfortable paradox at the heart of the current AI economy: workers at the lower end of the income scale are being paid modest wages to generate the precise data that will eventually train machines to perform - and potentially replace - their own labour. This is not a distant hypothetical. It is happening now, at scale, in Tamil Nadu and other parts of India.

The phenomenon also highlights the uneven distribution of AI's economic benefits. While global technology companies and their Fortune 500 clients stand to benefit enormously from the resulting automation, the Indian workers providing the foundational training data earn approximately two dollars an hour. The structural inequality embedded in this arrangement has not gone unnoticed by Indian policymakers, with NITI Aayog specifically calling out the neglect of informal workers in mainstream AI policy discussions.

What It Means for India

India has strategically positioned itself as a global hub for AI data creation, processing, and annotation. This provides employment in the short term, particularly for workers in Tamil Nadu and other states where Objectways and similar firms recruit. The emerging field of spatial AI is creating a new category of gig-like work accessible to housewives, factory workers, and others outside the traditional technology sector.

However, the long-term implications are more complex. NITI Aayog has explicitly warned that India's 490 million informal workers - who form the backbone of the economy - are the least represented in national AI policy conversations, yet face significant displacement risk as automation matures. The same infrastructure being built with Indian labour today could reduce the demand for that very labour in household, manufacturing, and service sectors in the years ahead. Digital labour expert Aditi Surie of the Indian Institute for Human Settlements has noted that AI data collection services are likely to grow, suggesting the current employment wave could expand before it contracts.

Industry Impact

The humanoid robotics market is attracting substantial investment globally. Morgan Stanley has projected that over one billion humanoid robots could be deployed worldwide by 2050, primarily for industrial and commercial purposes. This forecast is driving demand for large volumes of physical AI training data - the category that Indian workers are currently supplying.

Objectways counts Fortune 500 multinationals among its clients and integrates with Amazon SageMaker, a widely used machine learning platform. In 2026, AI companies represent 25 of the 98 newly minted unicorn startups globally, according to verified reporting from Digital Journal, indicating that investor confidence in the sector remains strong. Companies like Humyn Labs in Bengaluru are also expanding the definition of AI training to include speech pattern data, widening the market for AI data collection services in India beyond video alone.

Latest Developments

The AFP investigation, published on June 11, 2026, provided direct on-the-ground reporting from Objectways facilities in Tamil Nadu's Karur district, documenting both home-based and studio-based AI data collection operations. The report followed the release of a NITI Aayog report focused on AI's impact on informal workers, which was published ahead of a global AI summit held in India in 2026. India's AI Impact Summit 2026, held in New Delhi earlier this year, highlighted how robotic systems are reshaping manufacturing, healthcare, agriculture, and logistics, according to reporting by NewsonAir, the official broadcaster of the government of India.

As of the date of publication, Objectways continues to expand operations in Tamil Nadu, with workers recording an estimated 90 short video clips per day per individual trainer. The company's studio facilities in Karur are designed to simulate varied domestic environments to meet client specifications from global AI developers.

Top India News Analysis

India's emergence as a centre for AI training data reflects a familiar economic pattern: the country provides cost-competitive labour at the foundational layers of a global technology supply chain, while the majority of the value created accumulates elsewhere. The spatial AI and humanoid robotics sector is following this pattern closely.

What distinguishes this moment from earlier outsourcing waves is the self-undermining quality of the work. Previous generations of Indian data annotation workers helped train AI to process text and images; the current generation is training AI to replicate physical human movement. The gap between generating that training data and being displaced by its product is narrowing. NITI Aayog's warning about informal workers is therefore not merely a policy concern - it reflects a structural risk that is traceable directly to the activities now underway in Karur and Chennai. Whether India can leverage its role as an AI training hub into longer-term technology sector growth, rather than a temporary employment bridge, remains an open question based on verified reporting available at the time of publication.

Key Takeaways

  • Thousands of Indian workers in Tamil Nadu and other states are earning approximately 250 rupees per hour by recording everyday tasks to train AI-powered humanoid robots.
  • AI data company Objectways, based in Tamil Nadu's Karur district, employs workers in home, factory, and studio settings and counts Fortune 500 multinationals as clients.
  • The training method relies on first-person "egocentric data" captured through head-mounted cameras, smart glasses, and motion sensors.
  • Morgan Stanley projects over one billion humanoid robots in global use by 2050, primarily for industrial and commercial applications.
  • India has strategically positioned itself as a global hub for AI data creation and annotation, providing short-term employment while contributing to long-term automation risk.
  • NITI Aayog has warned that India's approximately 490 million informal workers are largely absent from mainstream AI policy discussions despite facing significant displacement risk.
  • Workers and experts express divided views: some see a future of human-robot collaboration, while others - including workers themselves - acknowledge that younger generations may face serious employment challenges.
  • The AI sector accounted for 25 of 98 new global unicorn startups in 2026, reflecting continued investor confidence in the field.

Sources Consulted

  • AFP via Dawn.com - "Folding clothes, making coffee and sandwich - Indian workers training AI robots to take their jobs," June 11, 2026
  • TechXplore - "The Indian workers training AI robots to take their jobs," June 11, 2026
  • Al Jazeera - "India's workers are training AI robots to take their jobs," June 11, 2026
  • Digital Journal - "The Indian workers training AI robots to take their jobs," June 11, 2026
  • Milli Chronicle - "India's AI Trainers Teach Robots the Skills That May Replace Human Labor," June 11, 2026
  • NewsonAir (Government of India) - "AI Takes Center Stage at India AI Impact Summit 2026," February 27, 2026
  • NITI Aayog Report on AI and Informal Workers (referenced in AFP reporting, 2026)

Author: R Prem Kumar

Publisher: Top India News