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The 30-member JPC, chaired by Meenakshi Lekhi, has already been given two extensions by Parliament for submitting its report on the invoice
A senior member of the JPC from an opposition get together has flagged Part 35 of the invoice, which permits the Centre to exempt its businesses from some or all provisions of the invoice
The member urged that such an exemption ought to be granted solely when public curiosity outweighs breaching the proper to privateness
Members of the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC), constituted to deliberate upon the Private Knowledge Safety Invoice, 2019, are reportedly cut up on a number of essential features of the proposed laws, which was launched in Parliament in December 2019.
A number of the contentious features of the invoice embody the supply permitting the federal government entry to delicate knowledge of residents with out their consent, knowledge localisation and the absence of judicial participation in deciding on the pinnacle of the regulatory physique.
The 30-member JPC, chaired by Bharatiya Janata Get together (BJP) MP Meenakshi Lekhi, has already been given two extensions by Parliament for submitting its report on the invoice. The JPC is now required to submit its report on the invoice through the second week of this yr’s winter session of Parliament.
It’s anticipated that the ultimate invoice, after incorporating the options made by the JPC, can be offered in Parliament throughout subsequent yr’s funds session.
The committee has held a number of consultations with stakeholders, whereas additionally questioning Indian client web corporations comparable to Paytm, Ola and Uber, in addition to international tech giants comparable to Twitter, Fb and Google, amongst others, on important features of knowledge assortment and storage.
In line with the Financial Occasions, which first reported the event, a senior member of the JPC from an opposition get together has flagged Part 35 of the invoice, which permits the Centre to exempt its businesses from some or all provisions of the invoice for nationwide safety and public order.
The member urged that such an exemption ought to be granted provided that it’s essential, proportionate and when public curiosity outweighs breaching the proper to privateness.
Criticism Of PDP Invoice
In line with a particular report by coverage think-tank Observer Analysis Basis (ORF), “blanket exemptions and lack of executive or judicial safeguards will fail to meet the standards laid out by the Supreme Court in the KS Puttaswamy v. Union of India case, where it ruled that measures restricting the right to privacy must be backed by law, serve a legitimate aim, be proportionate to the objective of the law, and have procedural safeguards against abuse. Vague grounds that trigger exemptions, absence of procedure in granting exemptions and the lack of independent oversight are major concerns.”
The report additionally talked about that utilization of phrases like ‘national security’, ‘sovereignty’ and ‘territorial integrity’ are sure to be interpreted subjectively and will thus be misused to justify exemptions. A committee of consultants underneath the chairmanship of Justice BN Srikrishna, in its report titled, ‘A Free and Fair Digital Economy, Protecting Privacy, Empowering Indians’, submitted to the Ministry of Electronics and Info Expertise (MeitY) in 2018, had famous the significance of making certain, “the pillars of data protection are not shaken by a vague and nebulous national security exception.”
Why Is Private Knowledge Safety Essential?
As web penetration spreads throughout the globe to incorporate greater than half of humanity and India accounts for 12% of those 3.8Bn web customers — the issues round knowledge safety and cybersecurity have additionally taken place. At the moment, good gadgets powered by quick web networks are accumulating and storing knowledge about each person motion and behavior from tune preferences to viewership patterns, to well being statistics and way more.
In such a world, the governance of how this knowledge is saved and processed turns into indispensable. Thus, international locations around the globe have began to concentrate to creating data-related legal guidelines and insurance policies.
The PDP Invoice may also require startups to revamp their data-related processes and embed privateness inside their system architectures. Prior to now, the Ministry of Electronics and Info Expertise (MeitY) has invited all stakeholders who could be impacted by the laws, to supply their options and feedback on the invoice.
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