Efforts are on to turn Arunachal Pradesh’s Keyi Panyor into India’s first Bio-Happiness district

Soumya Swaminathan, Chairperson of M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation and Principal Advisor of National Tuberculosis Elimination Programme (NTEP), inaugurated ‘The Hindu Sustainability Dialogues’, a one-day summit being held at Saveetha Institute of Medical and Technical Sciences in Chennai on Tuesday (January 6, 2026).

The Hindu Sustainability Dialogues, in partnership with Saveetha Institute of Medical and Technical Sciences (SIMATS), brought together leading academics, subject matter experts, policymakers and industry stakeholders for a dialogue on sustainability. 

The chief guest of the event held at Saveetha Medical College, Thandalam, Chennai, Dr. Soumya Swaminathan was felicitated by L.V. Navaneeth, CEO, The Hindu Group and N.M. Veeraiyan, Founder and Chancellor, SIMATS.

In her keynote address, Ms. Swaminathan said the M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation will revive the concept of Bio-Happiness, a term coined by late M.S. Swaminathan, in his centenary year. A project to convert the newest district of Keyi Panyor of Arunachal Pradesh into India’s first Bio-Happiness district has begun, she added.

She went on to state that traditional AI is good with image recognition and can help scale up the already existing platforms of app-based plant clinics. Generative AI could be helpful in many fields as well but caution must be taken against spreading misinformation and disinformation, especially deepfakes, Dr. Swaminathan added.