From Bollywood Dreams to AI Sarees: How India is Redefining Google’s Nano Banana and Shaping the Global AI Conversation 

India has emerged as the leading user of Google’s Nano Banana AI image generator (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image), driving the Gemini app to the top of its app stores with a 667% surge in downloads. Beyond sheer volume, the country’s usage is uniquely characterized by creative, cultural trends like reimagining oneself in 1990s Bollywood aesthetics and generating “AI saree” portraits. This massive adoption has turned India into a global trendsetter, amplifying phenomena like the “figurine” trend, but it also highlights significant privacy concerns as users upload personal photos. The nation’s engagement demonstrates how a global technology is being profoundly adapted for local storytelling, nostalgia, and identity exploration, making India a critical cultural compass for the future of AI.

From Bollywood Dreams to AI Sarees: How India is Redefining Google’s Nano Banana and Shaping the Global AI Conversation 

When Google DeepMind’s David Sharon stood before reporters this week and revealed that India was the undisputed number one user of its whimsically named “Nano Banana” AI image generator, it was a data point that surprised no one yet explained everything. In the sprawling, vibrant digital bazaar that is India—the world’s second-largest smartphone and internet market—a new technological toy was always going to find a massive audience. 

But the real story, the one that has Google’s engineers and cultural analysts leaning in with fascination, isn’t the number of users. It’s the profound, uniquely Indian way they are using it. While the world might be using AI image generators for memes and fantasy art, India is engaged in something far more intimate: a massive, collective act of digital nostalgia, identity exploration, and cultural storytelling. 

This isn’t just adoption; it’s a creative reinterpretation. India isn’t just using Nano Banana; it is making it its own. 

The Unstoppable Rise of the (Nano) Banana 

First, let’s ground this in scale. According to data from Appfigures, the Gemini app (Nano Banana’s home) saw an average of 1.9 million monthly downloads in India between January and August 2025—a figure 55% higher than in the United States. Following the Nano Banana update in September, daily downloads in India exploded, peaking at a staggering 414,000 on September 13th, a 667% surge that propelled Gemini to the top of both the iOS and Google Play charts. 

These numbers tell a story of explosive growth, but they are just the preamble. The real narrative is found in the trends themselves, where millions of Indians are using this powerful tool as a lens to view their past, present, and future. 

The Retro Revolution: A Nation Time-Travels to the ‘90s 

The most potent and uniquely Indian trend is the wholesale recreation of 1990s Bollywood aesthetics. Indians aren’t just generating old photos; they are meticulously crafting avatars of themselves from an era they may have lived through or only heard stories about. 

This involves more than a simple sepia filter. Users are prompting the AI to generate images with period-specific details: 

• Fashion: Oversized shirts, bold prints, iconic bomber jackets, and the quintessential bandanas made famous by stars like Shah Rukh Khan and Salman Khan. 

• Hairstyles: The distinctive, voluminous “jheri curl” look and long, center-parted hair for women. 

• Makeup and Ambiance: The specific cinematic grain, the softened glow, and the distinct color palette that defines 90s Bollywood cinematography. 

This is more than a trend; it’s a form of social history. It’s a generation using AI to connect with a cultural golden age, to see themselves not as historical figures, but as protagonists in the movies that defined a nation’s pop culture. A variation of this, the “AI Saree,” sees users generating vintage-style portraits of themselves in traditional attire, merging timeless cultural symbols with retro aesthetics. 

The Global Tourist and The Miniature Self: Local Trends Go Global 

Another early trend saw Indians placing themselves in front of iconic global landmarks like London’s Big Ben or its red telephone booths. This “armchair tourism” speaks to aspirational dreams and a desire to connect with a global identity, all from a smartphone screen. 

Perhaps the most telling example of India’s influence is its role in globalizing the “figurine” trend. As Google’s Sharon noted, this trend of creating miniature, toy-like versions of oneself first emerged in Thailand, spread to Indonesia, but it was its explosive adoption in India that catapulted it to global virality. India, with its massive user base and prolific content sharing on platforms like Instagram and WhatsApp, often acts as an amplifier, taking niche internet trends and launching them into the stratosphere. 

Beyond the Image: The Deeper Human Drive 

What do these trends tell us? They reveal universal human desires, expressed through a specific cultural lens: 

• The Quest for Identity: All art is a search for self. Are we the modern tech professional, the 90s heartthrob, the global citizen, or the traditional descendant? Nano Banana becomes a digital mirror, allowing users to explore these multifaceted identities in a tangible, visual way. 

• Nostalgia as a Comfort: In a rapidly changing world, nostalgia is a powerful anchor. Revisiting the perceived simplicity and glamour of the 90s is a form of comfort and a way to process the present by recontextualizing the past. 

• Democratization of Creativity: Not everyone can paint or use complex design software. AI tools like Nano Banana lower the barrier to entry, empowering millions to participate in creative expression. They are not just consumers of culture; they are now active creators of it. 

The Shadow in the Spotlight: Privacy in the Age of AI Play 

This unprecedented creativity does not come without a price. The very act that fuels these trends—uploading personal selfies to a cloud-based AI model—raises significant privacy and safety concerns. When we upload our likeness, our family’s likeness (as seen in the trend of animating old photos of grandparents with Veo 3), where does that data go? How is it stored? Could it be used to train other models? 

Google’s response, as outlined by Sharon, is a mix of technical safeguards and transparency. The visible diamond-shaped watermark and the hidden SynthID marker are crucial first steps in labeling AI-generated content, helping to combat misinformation. The planned public-facing detection tool will be even more critical. 

However, Sharon’s comment that “we don’t try to assume what the user’s intent is” points to a core tension in AI development. The drive to fulfill user queries must be balanced with ethical safeguards. As these tools become more embedded in our lives, the companies behind them bear a growing responsibility to protect users from themselves—from unintentional data sharing, from creating harmful content, or from having their digital identity misused. 

The fact that India leads in downloads but accounts for only 1.5% of in-app purchases ($95,000 vs. the U.S.’s $2.3 million) is a fascinating economic footnote. It highlights a market that is incredibly enthusiastic about free, accessible technology but is still warming to the premium tiers of digital services. Yet, its record 18% month-over-month growth in spending suggests this is beginning to change rapidly. 

The Road Ahead: India as a Cultural Compass 

India’s relationship with Google’s Nano Banana is a case study in how technology is localized. It proves that the most powerful AI tools are not those that are merely used, but those that are adapted. 

For Google and other tech giants, India is no longer just a market; it is a muse and a compass. The creative patterns emerging from its users provide invaluable insight into what people truly want from AI: not just utility, but connection, memory, and story. As Google continues to learn and improve its platforms, the feedback from this vibrant, demanding, and creative user base will be instrumental in shaping the ethical and functional future of AI for us all. 

The lesson is clear: the future of technology is not just written in code in Silicon Valley. It is being vividly imagined, one retro Bollywood portrait and one AI saree at a time, on the smartphones of millions across India.