Opposition MPs file dissent note on data bill

Congress’s Jairam Ramesh, Manish Tewari, and Gaurav Gogoi, and Trinamool Congress (TMC) Derek O’Brien and Mahua Moitra also highlighted the lack of oversight of the bill and the absence of a state-level Data Protection Authority (DPA).

They filed a dissent note with committee chairman PP Chowdhury on Monday after the report was accepted by a 30-member panel ahead of the winter session of Parliament that begins next week. The report will be placed before Parliament for discussion in the upcoming session.

Tiwari has objected to the entirety of the bill in its present form. In a 10-page dissent note, it was reviewed Hindustan Times, he said there is an “inherent design flaw” in the formulation of the bill.

“The bill, as it stands, creates two parallel universes—one for the private sector where it will be enforced with full rigor and one for the government where it is full of exemptions, carvings and escape clauses. As a plaintiff In my limited experience of three decades in the U.S., I have always been taught and understood that a Fundamental Right is primarily enforceable against the State. seeks to provide blanket exemption for or for a limited period, is ultra vires of the fundamental right to privacy as laid down by a 9-judge Bench.Ray Puttuswamy (2017) Supreme Court of India in 10 SCC 1, The MLA argued.

He also opposed age-fixing of child-friendly online resources and asked social media firms to compulsorily verify all their users and customers, failing which they fined between 3-5% of their global turnover should go. He said that critical personal data should be handled by the DPA and not the government.

Ramesh opposed the exemption given to the government under Section 35 of the Bill. He argued that the section gives unbridled power to exempt any government agencies from the proposed law.

Gogoi said the report has failed to “quantify the penalty under the framework”.

O’Brien and Mitra said the consensus-building process on the report has been “expedited”, condemning the final draft for “lacking adequate safeguards to protect the privacy of data principals”. He also expressed concern with regard to the selection of the DPA chairperson and said that there is “huge participation of the central government” in this.

People familiar with the matter said Biju Janata Dal MP Amar Patnaik is also likely to object to the non-inclusion of state-level DPAs in the bill. The governments of Karnataka and Maharashtra made this demand during the meetings of their representatives with the committee.