Parliamentary standing committee has approved data protection bill: Vaishnaw

“Want to share some good news that the parliamentary standing committee on IT and communications, which is the committee that deals with this subject. Before this is introduced to Parliament, they have in advance examined it and they have given us a big thumbs up,” Vaishnaw said in a virtual address to the Nasscom Technology and Leadership Forum.

The government released the draft bill for public consultation in November last year.

“The Digital Personal Data Protection Bill is a legislation that frames out the rights and duties of the citizen (Digital Nagrik) on one hand and the obligations to use collected data lawfully of the Data Fiduciary on the other hand,” the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology said in an explanatory note put out with the draft bill.

Vaishnaw, also the Union minister for railways and communications, said tech regulations have become “reasonably complex” globally with different countries trying out different things. “It is at a (moment) if we don’t do it right, today, then we might get into trouble, which we didn’t anticipate,” he said.

He said two members of parliament of another country told him in Davos they wished their country had the “common sense” while forming tech regulations, which India has shown.

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Vaishnaw said the chief executive of a global newspaper had told him that the world will start using India’s template globally.The minister also said that India has also become a strategic location to set up manufacturing bases to diversify and not depend on just one country.

“So many CEOs I met at Davos, most of them have already committed to expanding their supply-chain base in India. Or if they are not present in India, they are looking at setting up their supply-chain bases here,” said Vaishnaw. “At least three of them, who didn’t have their presence in India, said that by May and September 2023, they’ll do their groundbreaking ceremonies in India.”