Galgotias University faces backlash for passing off Chinese robodog, Korean drone as in-house innovations

Visitors at the Galgotias University’s stall during the AI Impact Summit, at Bharat Mandapam, in New Delhi, on Wednesday. The private university was asked to vacate its stall at the summit after a controversy over display of a made-in-China robotic dog as its own innovation
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The government on Wednesday asked Galgotias University to vacate the premises of AI Impact Summit after it was found to be passing off a Chinese-made robodog and a Korean-made drone as innovations developed in-house by its Centre of Excellence. What surfaced as a sideshow over misleading claims on Tuesday snowballed into a full-fledged controversy on Wednesday, hitting international headlines and overshadowing other discussions about the summit on social media.

viral topic

From social media to the mainstream and Opposition parties, the Galgotias University controversy remained the main topic of discussion connected to the AI Summit. On Tuesday, a university representative, identified as Neha Singh, told DD News that a robotic dog being displayed at the stall was called ORION and that it had been developed in-house at the University’s Centre of Excellence. In a video that later became viral, she was seen as claiming that the university has also developed a soccer drone, which was also displayed at the expo. She claimed that from end-to-end engineering to application of the soccer drone, everything was done in-house at the university.

Soon, social media users flagged that the robodog has been made by Chinese firm Unitree and is commercially available for sale. Later, it was also pointed out that the soccer drone is known as Striker V3 ARF with origins in South Korea. Reacting to the issu, on Wednesday morning, the government asked the university to vacate the premises. 

However, representatives of the Greater Noida-based University kept defending their claims as a “mere misrepresentation”, and claimed that their statements were misconstrued. The university representatives did not move out of the venue, claiming they had received no instruction to do so. The whole issue turned into a big drama at the venue with the electricity to the university pavilion being cut off as their representatives tried to brazen out the storm.

Meanwhile, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi slammed the government on the social media, saying: “Instead of leveraging India’s talent and data, the AI summit is a disorganised PR spectacle — Indian data up for sale, Chinese products showcased.”

Eventually, the university contingent moved out of the venue. By evening, it released a fresh statement apologising profusely for the confusion created at the summit and pinning the blame on its representatives. “One of our representatives, manning the pavilion, was ill-informed. She was not aware of the technical origins of the products, and in her enthusiasm to be on camera, gave factually incorrect information even though she was not authorised to speak to the press,” the university stated.

Published on February 18, 2026