IT Minister to present Digital Personal Data Protection Bill tomorrow

“Ashwini Vaishnaw to move for leave to introduce a Bill to provide for the processing of digital personal data in a manner that recognises both the right of individuals to protect their personal data and the need to process such data for lawful purposes and for matters connected therewith or incidental thereto. Also to introduce the Bill,” said the list of business uploaded by the Lok Sabha.

Submissions made by the IT Ministry’s officials to the Standing Committee on Communications and IT also offer an insight into some of the final contours of the Bill. For instance, as per the panel’s report, any appeals against decisions made by the Data Protection Board — the adjudicatory body proposed to implement norms of the Bill — could be handled by the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT). TDSAT was not mentioned in the 2022 version of the draft Bill.

Similarly, officials informed the committee that an entire section on “deemed consent” has been removed from the final version, and has added provisions of processing personal data for “legitimate uses”. Under the previous version of the Bill, private entities could have assumed consent for various use cases, however, in the final version, that could be limited to a few use cases.

The committee, relying on information submitted by IT Ministry officials, said the final version of the Bill will also allow the processing of personal data for certain legitimate use cases, including national security, the government being able to offer subsidies , licences etc., public health emergencies, and employer-employee requirements, among other things.