Indian government withdraws Personal Data Protection Bill | Hacker News Reader

Indian government withdraws Personal Data Protection Bill

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173 pointstechmagus107 comments

In case you are serious about understanding why it was pulled out and really care about the details for such an action, I highly recommend you check the Joint Committee on the Personal Data Protection report [1] the Press Release section where they released the 534 pages report on it.

Gist of it is - the committee recommended major changes across the board in all sections of the act so the IT Ministry would rework the bill and present it for discussion again in the parliament.

I know India looks like a lawless place because of the chaotic news coverage in the NYtimes but it is a democracy and most if not all government action have rational policy choices that presented in the Indian parliament. The loksabha proceedings (especially the question hour) is the best way to understand what goes on in India.

Edit: For those without a lot of time should check the point by point explanation and rebuttal for the recommendations here [2]

1. http://loksabhaph.nic.in/Committee/CommitteeInformation.aspx...

2. https://vidhilegalpolicy.in/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/JPC-P...

Are there any reputable Indian law/policy news sites or individuals who you (or anyone) might recommend following?

To be fair I can't think of any specific sites like that I follow for US law/policy news, just a variety of people on Twitter.

Economic Political & Weekly, caravanmagazine.in, restofworld.org

Thanks!

I've followed restofworld.org for a year now and it's a really fantastic site, great mission.

However their scope is extremely broad: "Everything in developing economies for Americans", basically.

I think caravan might be extremely left wing though.

Not really, I would consider them a broader opposition to the current regime

> Are there any reputable Indian law/policy news sites or individuals who you (or anyone) might recommend following?

https://www.livelaw.in is a pretty good one, it is usually very upto date and accurate.

live Law is a legal news website and not really a policy site so is the others mentioned in the thread.

Vidhi is a legal policy think tank based.

They did a point by point break down of recommendations of JPC and explanation you can check it here [1]

https://vidhilegalpolicy.in/research/referencer-on-the-jpcs-...

https://prsindia.org/

India is a diverse country with diversity within both the federal level and the state level. I have listed a subset of sources I and friends of mine from Indian policy backgrounds (IAS, IPS, MHA, etc) tended to trust. This is not a complete list, and shows my own regional biases.

Feel free to AMA me or discuss additional recommendations in this thread. I don't get much of an opportunity to discuss Social Sciences since I switched careers to the Tech world.

edit:

I will not dignify any flame-bait conversations. I will chat with people from any political camp, but only if they chat in a non-combative manner.

======================

General Journalism:

Most newspapers and news media channels in India are owned by Oligarchs supporting one party or the other.

The only Indian newspaper I've personally trusted is The Tribune (https://www.tribuneindia.com/) due to it's being owned by a non-profit foundation with a perpetual endowment created by a banking magnate back in the late 19th century.

======================

Long Form Journalism:

The Caravan - https://caravanmagazine.in/

Has a bit of a center-left and progressive leaning, but pretty well investigated and written articles.

The Print - https://theprint.in/

Has a bit of a center-right leaning, but strong informed articles on Indian Defence Policy and Developmental News (I think they have some ex-MoD and IAS beats).

The Wire - https://thewire.in/

Has a center-left leaning, but a good source for articles on the negative ground realities that exist in various different regions of South Asia. Also surprisingly strong at Indian Foreign Policy (I think they have some ex-MEA beats)

Himal Magazine - https://www.himalmag.com/

Has a center-left and progressive leaning, but a strong source on the anthropological and sociological aspects of South Asian studies.

Swarajya - https://swarajyamag.com/

Has a center-right to far right leaning, but a strong source to understand BJP and Hinduvta politics from their perspective.

Outlook India - https://www.outlookindia.com/

Good long form journalism and analysis. Haven't noticed much bias one way or the other as they tend to publish ideologues from all spectrums of Indian politics.

======================

Public Policy Think Tanks and Journals:

Observer Research Foundation - https://www.orfonline.org/

Amazing articles and papers on South Asian Foreign Policy and Developmental Economics. Centrist/Institutionalist bias as it is staffed by ex-IAS and policymaker types

Carnegie India Foundation - https://carnegieindia.org/

Similar as ORF, but with a stronger bias towards IR.

Economic and Political Weekly - https://www.epw.in/

One of the premier Indian Social Sciences journals. Very strong articles on South Asian social sciences in general.

Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy - https://vidhilegalpolicy.in/

Amazing organization working on legal policy analysis in India. Very easy to read for those who are not from a legal background

Centre de Sciences Humaines Delhi - https://www.csh-delhi.com/

Strong research on developmental economics and regional socio-political dynamics in South Asia.

The Diplomat - https://thediplomat.com/

Probably the best foreign policy magazine in the APAC region. Well researched and a diverse amount of voices from all sides of the political spectrum

Lowy Institute - https://www.lowyinstitute.org/

Probably the best APAC foreign policy think tank. It's essentially Brookings Level

Caveats:

The Indian center is very different from the American center. Economically, the Indian center is closer to Bernie-Sanders than it is to Biden. The Indian left (academic and on the ground) is actually communist and the Indian right still tends to be fairly center-left (as far as the US goes) The social left-right dimension is its own thing, and does not map neatly onto similar intuitions in the west.

The last caveat is that Indian secularism is very different from western secularism.

_________

That being said, This is a good list.

> The Print

I am personally biased towards favoring 'The Print' more so than the other organizations. Shekhar Gupta leads an ideologically clear (socially liberal, economically liberal) media house, always quotes their sources and does well to separate reporting from opinion. I would not call it right leaning by any means.

> Caravan

I have mixed opinions on Caravan. At their best, they are great. But, they can vary between excellent left-leaning journalism to outright left-wing fear mongering. I'm sure you'll see some strong opinions thrown around about them, and both the positive and negative tend to be well deserved.

> Wire and OutlookIndia

I have a low opinion of both. I wouldn't go as far as to call them a rag, but I wouldn't defend them against those accusations either.

> Swarajya - but a strong source to understand BJP and Hinduvta politics from their perspective

Agreed. Won't go there for news, but serves a purpose.

Glad you added that caveat to this thread!

A lot of Western commentators don't tend to realize that aspect of Indian politics, instead applying a federal American lens (though American politics is actually equally diverse as well).

To any Americans reading this thread, Indian politics is HEAVILY local party driven. BJP MPs from states like HP would have entirely different opinions or backgrounds from BJP MPs from a region like Purvanchal (Eastern UP). In additional, most elected officials in Indian politics don't really have party loyalty. They'll change parties at the drop of the hat (or start their own) if they feel their opportunity to climb up the political rungs are best served elsewhere. That is a MASSIVE reason the BJP/NDA+ won like a steamroller in 2019 - a number of up and coming INC politicians changed party affiliations because their upward potential was blocked by regional INC machines.

In addition, it is very common for regional political barons to split off from the national party and make their own regional party - this happened with the INC in West Bengal (Mamata Banerjee and the TMC), Uttar Pradesh (Mulayam Singh Yadav and the Samajwadi Party), Maharashtra (Bal Thackeray and the Shiv Sena - which itself split into 2 parties this week - and Tariq Anwar and the NCP) , and Andhra Pradesh (YSR Raja Reddy and the YSR Congress) to name a few states. Captain Amarinder Singh - the former Chief Minister (Indian equivalent of Governor) of Punjab - himself is rumored to be making a regional party in Punjab now as well after internal politicking in the INC forced him out of CMship.

That said, similar stuff will eventually happen to the BJP as well. I've heard rumblings at the grassroots level in Haryana, HP, and Jammu about discontent with local BJP acolytes and there is probably going to be a major shift in Indian politics over the next 10 years as a new generation of local parties form.

==========================

> The Print

Agree with you that they are not right leaning in any way. I labelled them as slightly center right due to their occasional support for certain pro-market reforms (ones that I do support by the way). Honestly, I probably could have called them centrist but the edit timer has run down on that comment.

> Wire and Outlook

I'm curious about your reasons for having a low opinion of them? I've had reservations about some opinions the Wire reports, but at least in the region my family is from they've been pretty even handed reporting on abuses of power that have occurred. W/ regards to Outlook I was debating whether to add them to this list, but I have read some quality articles from them on occasion.

This is golden. It's nice to see people add context to Indian politics on HN. All too often, even the most well-read American has a naïve understanding of Indian politics. You're doing God's work giving folks glimpses into the sheer difference, complexity and nuance of Indian politics.

> but the edit timer has run down on that comment

such is life.

> I'm curious about your reasons for having a low opinion of them?

I think part of it is because I only ever read them when someone tells me about how they mis-reported on something. So, it might be personal bias where I overtly hone-in on the mistakes they make. I don't read either OutlookIndia or TheWire enough to make strong claims about their caliber as journalism houses. But when I get linked to them, I make sure to get a 2nd opinion.

Haha thanks! To be fair, as someone who is Desi American, a lot of the incomplete reporting about India that happens in the Western newspapers is due to bad pay. The NYT pays reporters $12k a year/8.4lpa in Delhi NCR, while cable news channels like NDTV, Aaj Tak, etc would pay a similar level reporter around $14-17k/10-12 lpa while giving much more political power (and the opportunity to take cash for unbalanced reporting if they want). Ergo, all the good reporters either start their own new wave media orgs like The Print or The Wire, or they become acolytes for a party (all parties do this of course - ain't no saints in Indian politics, not even the Sadhus, Peers, Yogis, Maulvis, or Sants).

Ain't no saints in politics anywhere, are there?

Yep, but having worked on the Hill, American politicians on both sides of the aisle are less douchey than the equivalent MPs I've interacted with in India and the UK.

> the committee recommended major changes across the board in all sections of the act

This bill was under discussion for 3 years. Every year the JCP keeps proposing new and different changes. After all this if you have 81/99 amendments, you have to question if it is nitpicking and stalling, especially when you have things like the Finance Bill and Farm Bill that get passed in record time.

This seems like a political decision more than anything. There is also the fact that the industry does not like this bill at all, there are some powerful corporations who entered the digital consumer space recently and would be seriously inconvenienced by this move.

Not everything is political. I can tell you this because I work with many of indian government departments very closely. The reservations JPC highlighted will be studied and after consultation with stakeholders it will tabled again.

FYI - The committee chairman and the IT Minister are from the same political party yet they disagreed and bill got pulled.

Here is a good premier on the JPC Recommendation [1]

https://vidhilegalpolicy.in/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/JPC-P...

Are these new concerns or concerns that arose during the preceding 3 years of discussions that remained unaddressed?

"It is a democracy" doesn't mean that it isn't also a frequently irrational cesspit. That doesn't necessarily mean it's any worse than at least two other superpowers, but it does mean it's not good. It's not due to the NYTimes coverage that the country seems the way it does, it's the exported culture (i.e. it is the face of IT-related international crime) and the types of incidents that can be found there (closing off an entire province full of normal people just because some of them do things you don't like is strictly barbaric, for example).

While that is true on rhetoric - on practice it is not. While 60% of bills went through parliamentary scrutiny prior to 2014 - the number today is just above 10%. Also Modi has the distinction of passing maximum bills without debate and bypassing the state senate altogether.

A sad consequence of one political party having a majority in the parliament. Modi supporters tout it as a harbinger of efficiency bill passing when in reality it's just eroded democracy.

Having a majority in parliament is the normal way of doing things

Unless you support the minority party in which case democracy is definitely not working and/or the voters for the majority party are deluded ;)

Majority rule and minority rights are democracy. Otherwise once vote in everyone is save … might as well no democracy.

Thank you. The minority rights and individual rights are cornerstone, democracy does not mean majority act as Emperors. There has to be strong guaranteed equal rights to all individual and minorities that allows them equal opportunity and recourse.

Its foundation is that all agree what we should all have as rights were we to ever find ourselves the minority, and those become the principles we cannot break and we owe to each individual to uphold. Beyond that, majority can decide, hopefully not stupidly and still considering minority's input, as any good leader should do, consider all data points relevant to best decision making.

To be fair, in many parliamentary systems it is very unusual for any one party to have an absolute majority. In most such systems, the winning party of an election often only wins a plurality of votes, and has to woo other parties to govern - either through a coalition or just a minority government.

India does not have a single party majority either but an alliance majority

The BJP by itself has a simple majority in the Lok Sabha, and makes up over 87% of the NDA's members in the Lok Sabha.

In 2009, Congress Party made up 78% of the UPA's members in the Lok Sabha.

Sure, though the UPA was still short of even a simple majority in the Lok Sabha, and was held up by outside support from the Left Front. The BJP's simple majority in the Lok Sabha from 2013 onwards is the first time any single party has held a majority since the 80s.

A majority in a parliamentary system still allows some room for debate and dissent since MPs are, in principle, representatives of their constituency and not of the party. However, in India, it is illegal for an MP to vote against the party line - that is grounds for their disqualification - due to the anti-defection law. Any debate is pure theatrics at this point and the party leadership is free to pass any law they want.

> in India, it is illegal for an MP to vote against the party line

Inn what way is this a functioning parliamentary system then?

> In what way is this a functioning parliamentary system then?

You can ask other parliamentary systems the same questions. For example, the Australian Labor Party requires its members to pledge their support for the collective ui decisions of the caucus, which prohibits them from "crossing the floor" as well.

Just as importantly, the Anti-“Crossing the Floor” law was passed in 1985 by the Congress Party under the leadership of Rajiv Gandhi (Son of Indira Gandhi, Husband of Sonia Gandhi, and Father of Rahul Gandhi). India’s been functioning under that system for almost 40 years, and I doubt Rahul Gandhi and Congress Party will repeal that law when they come back into party. That’s because it’s their law. They wrote it.

Do Indian MPs explicitly pledge to toe the party line?

Explicitly? No. At no point does a member sworn in as an MP have to then swear to affirm their party affiliation. In practice, however, the Anti-Defection Law deems anybody voting against the will of the party to have vacated their membership of the party, which can then be pursued to strip them of membership of the house.

Is it normal for MPs to speak out against the party line even while voting it?

Not at all. It's highly unusual for a politician to speak against the party line on a bill, if at all. The only time we ever see fracturing, if any, is around the elections, where dissatisfied members may break away or switch parties. It's not uncommon for people to switch allegiances if they were refused an election ticket as the party candidate, or for higher level politicians to form break away factions if refused the Chief Ministerial position, for example. The Anti-Defection Law allows breakaway factions only if at least 1/3rd leave en masse.

It's not a perfect system, but the provisions of the Anti-Defection Law tried to address what was a bigger issue in Indian politics - legislators changing sides for what turned out to be enormous sums of (undisclosed) money. In this climate, the incumbent party could bribe opposition members to prop up the government, and attempts to poach new legislators right after the elections reached ridiculous levels.

For what it's worth, while this does hinder a legislator from voting as per the will of their constituents even where they are at odds with the party line, within the Indian political system there are so many special interest parties that differ from each other in minor details of policy. In theory, the will of constituents could have been made manifest by voting for the policy adjacent party instead.

Again, it's not a perfect system, but it's attempting to fix the obvious issues that arose in India.

It's a feature of a multi-party parliamentary democracy - when a candidate is a representative of a party standing for any elections, and wins it, it is assumed that people voted for the candidate partly because of the electoral promises and visions of the party. Thus, if a party has made a promise to the electorate to enact some major law, and issues a whip in Parliament that all its representatives should support its passage, then they are legally bound to do so. They can still choose to abstain or even vote against it. But then the party can take action against them. (Note that this is only applicable when a party issues a whip, which democratic ones do only for laws it considers important.)

> in India, it is illegal for an MP to vote against the party line

That is not true at all. Anti-defection law is applied when elected officials run on a party and once elected decide to change their party affiliation. Not for individual bills.

It's not illegal. But that ensures their eviction from the party and can potentially destroy their political career.

The Anti-Defection Law can very much be applied if a legislator votes against a party whip, even for a bill. There are calls to limit its applicability only to votes on the government, but that is currently not the case.

Quoting from PRSIndia [1]:

Does the anti-defection law affect the ability of legislators to make decisions?

The anti-defection law seeks to provide a stable government by ensuring the legislators do not switch sides. However, this law also restricts a legislator from voting in line with his conscience, judgement and interests of his electorate. Such a situation impedes the oversight function of the legislature over the government, by ensuring that members vote based on the decisions taken by the party leadership, and not what their constituents would like them to vote for.

Political parties issue a direction to MPs on how to vote on most issues, irrespective of the nature of the issue. Several experts have suggested that the law should be valid only for those votes that determine the stability of the government (passage of the annual budget or no-confidence motions).

[1]: [The Anti-Defection Law Explained](https://prsindia.org/theprsblog/the-anti-defection-law-expla...)

So, when majority of the people support one political party that's called eroding democracy?

How did it erode democracy?

Many countries operate like this. It's the downside of having a parliamentary system (which IMO is better than a presidential one). Greece and Japan are good examples. Canada to a certain extent too in the past (with the LPC).

Also for a good chunk of its history, India has been run on super majorities as pointed out in this comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32346371

Wow. Do you have the source for the numbers? It's very surprising

I also need clarification on what he means by Modi bypassing parliament to pass his own bills. That’s not how a parliamentary system works. Imagine Tony Blair bypassing the House of Lords and the House of Commons to pass his own bill. Or Obama bypassing the Senate and House of Representatives to pass his own bill. It’s a very strange claim to me.

Not GGP, but I assume they mean that bills were passed through parliament without any real debate or amendments, since the governing party holds a super majority.

The UK has done the same when having a party majority in the House of Lords and House of Commons.

In the US things are different. Even if there is a party majority in the Senate and House, the Filibuster is powerful enough to table the party majority’s bills.

Unfortunately, the way things proceed in India tend to be more crass - where the opposition often tries to physically prevent the tabling of controversial bills. We've had occasions where members grabbed papers off the Speaker's desk, and members routinely try to block proceedings by entering the well of the House and sloganeering. This leads to the Speaker adjourning the session and/or the opposition staging a walkout during the actual vote. It's not uncommon to see parliamentary sessions with only the treasury benches full for the vote.

Maybe India takes inspiration from her colonizers?

"How did the British Parliament become a place where the person speaking is constantly interrupted while the US Congress is one where the audience is quiet?"

Answer: "It didn’t become such a place, it always was such a place. It started life as a collection of people sent by various towns to meet the King to petition him for some action or other. It was a totally formless group of individuals admitted to the King’s larger meeting hall when and if the King permitted. As such they would shout over each other in the attempt to get the King’s attention. Over the centuries it became more formalised and more structured, and a modicum of order imposed. But it has always had the character of a rowdy everybody against everybody discussion rather than an academic debate.

Famous Parliamentarians, particularly Winston Churchill, have enjoyed it being so and encouraged it. The width of the gangway is still two swords lengths, so they cannot engage swords across it, and the cloak rooms outside still have ribbons intended for you to hang your sword before entering the chamber. Parliament values its traditions of being a barely orderly town meeting."

I don't know how accurate that answer is, but it was the top comment in quora. Other sites show similar answers.

Makes sense that it's the system we inherited. For what it's worth, I'd rather have my representatives voice dissent loudly rather than compliance. I wish that dissent was channelled productively rather than show for the TV cameras, but alas, that's what we've got. I do think it's a superior system to the two party US system, especially for such a large and diverse nation like India. It desperately needs reform, though.

I thought Modi's party only had a super majority in the lower house though, don't they need both houses?

The party holds a simple majority (~ 55%) in the Lower House, while the alliance holds a near super majority (~ 63%) - the Indian system holds a super majority at 2/3rds of each house present and voting, not the total membership of the house.

The alliance does not hold the upper house, though they have a near simple majority.

1984: Rajiv Gandhi’s Congress Party got a super majority (77%)

1980: Indira Gandhi’s Congress Party got a super majority (65%)

1977: Indira Gandhi's Congress Party got a majority (56%)

1971: Indira Gandhi's Congress Party got a super majority (68%)

1967: Indira Gandhi's Congress Party got a majority (55%)

1962: Nehru's Congress Party at 73%

1957: Nehru's Congress Party at 75%

1952: Nehru's Congress Party at 74%

If the complaint is, "Supermajorities aren't a Democracy", then it must be agreed upon that India hasn't been been a Democracy under the Congress Party for 32 years out of the 75 years of independence.

> If the complaint is, "Supermajorities aren't a Democracy"

Is anybody actually saying that? For what its worth, I do think super majorities are corrosive long term for the multiparty Westminster style parliamentary systems. There is little incentive for compromise building or genuine debate on bills. It might even work if political parties had visible internal debate and discussion, and we can largely agree that this is not a thing in Indian political parties.

>>Also Modi has the distinction of passing maximum bills without debate and bypassing the state senate altogether

I think this comment can be interpreted that way to some extent. Reads like one person has the power to bypass an entire legislative house. That's not the reality though.

I do agree with you that having supermajority for a long time is not a good thing. Unfortunately for India, that's how it has been historically (Congress for long periods of time and now it looks like BJP)

The original claim was that the senate was bypassed (non-democratic).

A majority in the Senate is democratic if democratically elected etc.

Whereas increasing the power of the executive as is the trend in the USA by bypassing the house / Senate is corrosive to democracy in my view.

The original claim was that the senate was bypassed (non-democratic).

A majority in the Senate is democratic if democratically elected etc.

I'm not sure what this means - that the NDA government could bypass the Rajya Sabha for 90% (the number quoted in the original claim) of bills? That doesn't make sense. I don't see how that is even possible.

The only way that the Rajya Sabha can be effectively bypassed is by the Lok Sabha speaker certifying a bill as a Money Bill (famously, the Aadhaar Bill was a Money Bill). In that case the objections raised by the Rajya Sabha are non-binding on the Lok Sabha and can be rejected by the lower house, and is deemed to have passed after 14 days. I do not think that 90% of bills introduced by the Modi government were Money Bills. So how does the claim of 90% work?

I think anuraj edited his comment. He originally said, “Modi bypasses parliament to pass his own bills.” So our debates are starting to lose context.

I see.

The three routes Mr. Modi government has chosen to bypass parliamentary scrutiny and oversight on the law it creates are by bypassing parliamentary committee or passing them through ordinances or as money bill:

- Explainer: How the government makes new laws less robust by bypassing parliamentary panels: https://scroll.in/article/932186/explainer-how-the-governmen...

- How India’s Govt Is Setting In Place A New Structure For A Dysfunctional Parliament: https://article-14.com/post/how-india-s-govt-is-setting-in-p...

- Explained Ideas: How the Modi govt has been bypassing Parliament: https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/how-modi-governm...

- Manmohan Singh raps Modi govt for misuse of 'money bill' provisions - https://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/ma...

- Aadhaar Act as Money Bill: Why the Lok Sabha isn't Immune from Judicial Review - https://thewire.in/law/identity-of-the-aadhaar-act-supreme-c...

- Jairam Ramesh moves Supreme Court against treating Aadhaar bill as money bill - https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/jairam-ramesh-moves-s...

- A 7-judge bench will decide whether amendments to the PMLA could have been made through the Money Bill route - https://www.indiatoday.in/law/story/supreme-court-pmla-verdi...

Might well have the distinction of withdrawing bills without debate a la Farm bill.

In a parliamentary democracy, if the elected party in power has a majority, they can do what you're describing.

In a presidential democracy, if the Senate and House of Representatives is majority Democrats, then yes, the Democrats can do the same. Obama once had majority in House of Reps and Senate as well.

There is one thing that is different. The Filibuster is very powerful in the US. I’m not so sure the filibuster is a powerful tool in UK’s parliament and India’s Parliament.

> There is one thing that is different. The Filibuster is very powerful in the US. I’m not so sure the filibuster is a powerful tool in UK’s parliament and India’s Parliament.

The filibuster isn't a thing in the Indian system, but even in the US it can be broken by a super majority - which the governing alliance in India does have. Besides, the filibuster has rarely been used in recent times - more often than not, it's simply the threat of one.

Source for your assertions?

1. What were the number of bills passed in the "zero hour"

2. Which bills didn't meet the quorum and were passed off as ordinance and allowed to lapse?

3. Which bills were passed bypassing the time honoured state versus federal relations?

You make hollow assertions without backing up your claims.

They plan to bring very stringent bill to takeaway alldemocracy and freedom from the net.

You've got to be joking ...

I glanced over [2] ( https://vidhilegalpolicy.in/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/JPC-P... ) => right at the start it mentions this:

The Committee observes that it is impossible to distinguish personal and non-personal data. Therefore...

That sounds to me like a crazy statement for a new law that was in the process of being created since years?

India had universal suffrage in 1950 and has deep parliamentary traditions. India was a democracy before the US, France, UK, Spain and numerous other Western cradles of democracy.

US got universal suffrage in 1965 (Voting Rights act). France was killing a million Algerians whom it ruled and were demanding self-determination in 1954-1962 and finally became colony free in 1977. UK was running concentration camps in Kenya in the 1960s and free of its last colony in the 1980 approaching something like Universal Suffrage. Spain was a dictatorship till 1979.

On the spectrum of privacy india is on the furthest end of it. No one cares about privacy and actively give their data over to everyone. For example every vendor asks for your phone number and people don’t question it at all.

As great as the privacy law sounds I have a suspicion that it will just be used by police and the government to abuse authority and silence critics like they do with people tweeting anything the government doesn’t like. Hope I am wrong

Wasn't this always the case? There were once huge "phone-books" containing all phone numbers in an area mapped to people's names. This is not much different from giving out emails

And hence people who care about privacy have two numbers.

The article seems to suggest a relatively good bill shot down by a weak or corrupt government that serves the interests of big companies with bad practices who don't want to be sued, actual data predators, etc.

But without details, "Personal Data Protection" can be newspeak for government-sanctioned abuse, like laws against "Child Pornography" that are actually intended to establish interception platforms. Are there good summaries of these Indian laws?

I question your claim of a weak or corrupt government based on the article below. It sounds like there was pushback from Startups who complained about compliance intensity, concerns about definitions of data storage when it came to adversarial countries, and a host of other concerns:

History:

In 2017, the Indian Supreme Court recognised the right to privacy as a fundamental right within the ambit of the Constitution. The top court had directed the Centre to come up with a data protection framework for the country. The data protection law for India has been in the works since 2018, when a panel led by Justice Srikrishna, a retired judge of the Supreme Court, drew up a draft version of a Bill. The draft was reviewed by the JCP, which submitted its recommendations along with a draft Bill in November 2021.

Why has the Bill been withdrawn?

In a note circulated to Members of Parliament, Union IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw explained the reason behind the withdrawal of the Bill: “The Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019 was deliberated in great detail by the Joint Committee of Parliament. 81 amendments were proposed and 12 recommendations were made towards a comprehensive legal framework on the digital ecosystem. Considering the report of the JCP, a comprehensive legal framework is being worked upon. Hence, in the circumstances, it is proposed to withdraw ‘The Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019’ and present a new Bill that fits into the comprehensive legal framework.

The Bill was also seen as being too “compliance intensive” by startups of the country, The Indian Express had reported earlier. According to government sources, the revamped Bill will be much easier to comply with, especially for startups.

So what could the revamped Bill look like?

Specific provisions or contours of the upcoming new Bill are not known. But a senior official said that on the question of data localisation, the government is considering whether to add it to the planned new version of the Information Technology Act, and whether to allow cross-border data flows only to “trusted geographies”

When is the revamped Bill expected to be ready?

Minister of State for Electronics and IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar said the government will table the new legislation in Parliament “very quickly”. “The government has today withdrawn the Personal Data Protection Bill that was formulated in 2018 and re-written by the JCP in 2021,” Chandrasekhar said on Wednesday (August 3). “After considerable deliberation and examination of the JCP’s report, it was found that there is a need for a comprehensive redrawing of laws and rules taking into account some of the JCP’s comments and the emerging challenges and opportunities that arise from there. A comprehensive approach to the laws will be undertaken by the government and we will come back to Parliament very quickly after following the process of consultation,” he said.

According to sources in the IT Ministry, the government is aiming to bring the legislation in Parliament’s Winter Session. A senior official said that the new Bill would incorporate the broader ideas of data protection as recommended by the JCP, and would be in line with the Supreme Court’s landmark privacy judgment of 2017. Given the significant number of amendments suggested by the JCP, it was necessary to comprehensively redraw the contours of the proposed law, the official said.

https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/explained-sci-te...

As a side note: I don't know why AccessNow.org's blog post was upvoted. It's extremely light on details.

A complaint that the bill is "compliance intensive" could mean that the "startups" don't want to comply (so it must be a good bill), that the bill imposes expensive and unnecessary bureaucracy, or both.

Correspondingly, the government could be caving in to private interests, wisely redesigning a bad law, or both.

FYI, they withdrew it because of major issues that need to be rectified. it will be reintroduced later after the changes have been made. this is how a parliamentary democracy works, how much ever the american media tries to present India as a lawless mess. sure there's things to improve, but name one democracy where there isn't.

If you want to read policy research on Indian goverment PRS research is a good resource. They usually analyse new bills and amendments in Indian parliament.

https://prsindia.org/

+1 on this. I'm surprised I've never come across this before. Their annual reviews are on point.

Government withdrew the bill only to bring it back in a new form, since the original bill had something like 80 amendments.

You can guess how sovereign a country is by how they protect their own people, and how much effort they put into it (or rather their lack of motivation)

To me this looks like their government have different interests to protect, than protecting their own people

Not a great outlook for the future of India, in a world where tech will be even more predominant and cyberwarfare will pose serious threat to democracy

They are at the mercy of the american tech giants, maybe they lobby over there? I wouldn't be surprised since both Google and Microsoft are present over there

> To me this looks like their government have different interests to protect, than protecting their own people

Where did you derive this from? They are not scrapping the bill in its entirety, rather, they are bringing out a replacement bill.

>New Delhi [India], August 4 (ANI): Union Electronics and Information Technology Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Thursday explained the reason behind withdrawing the Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019, asserting that the aim is to bring new compressive legislation at par with technology landscape which is changing rapidly.

He further said that the Joint Committee of Parliament recommended 81 amendments in a Bill that was of 99 sections which practically, suggested for overhauling the Bill.

The government on Wednesday withdrew the Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019 and has decided to come up with new legislation in view of a large number of amendments suggested by the Joint Committee of Parliament towards a comprehensive legal framework on the digital ecosystem.

Speaking to ANI, the Union Minister said, the Joint Parliamentary Committee recommended major changes in the Bill, which was like rewriting the entire Bill.

“The Joint Parliamentary Committee did very extensive work. They consulted a very large number of stakeholders. After it, the Joint Committee of Parliament gave a very comprehensive report which recommended 81 amendments in a Bill that was of 99 sections, it was practically rewriting the entire bill. Apart from the amendments, they were some 12 major suggestions were there from the committee,” said Vaishnaw.

He said that it was important to withdraw the old Bill to come up with a contemporary and modern legal framework to tackle the challenges of coping with the rapidly changing technology.

https://theprint.in/india/personal-data-protection-bill-with...

Let's see what happens. Personally, most people really don't cares about their data privacy, it only really became a talking point when TikTok started gaining dominance in India cause China is a geopolitical and millitary threat. I don't have any real hopes of them enacting something close to the GDPR ever.

Majority of the arguments posted here are only for "Modi-ashing"; I'd be tempted to assume they have no idea about the inner workings of the parliamentary processes or how laws are made or governed.

The "discussion" has veered off from the initial Joint Parliamentary Committe reports on the incompatibility of the far reaching law on personal data protection. The bill is just withdrawn to be replaced by a different one. There's nothing special there. That's the purpose of the JPC, and I am glad the Government avoided the adversarial clash with the JPC to account for the suggestions therein.

I do not understand why legislator of a non-US country is not instantly copying GDPR. It has solid spread already and the rules are adequately balancing customers, law and company interests (yes, that does not look like but hey, advertisement is still possible). International collaboration is much easier like that.

GDPR has this very fancy article saying: This all applies, except a law says otherwise. As a government, this is then up to you how many laws you create for your own surveillance and other state apparatus. Citizens get a nice benefit. Big companies anyway need to adhere to GDPR one way or the other due to the international market. Local companies which want to collect citizens data should get their users consent. That is not so hard. Even data privacy paranoid Germany has a private credit rating system which works for 50+ years.

There is no other reason except corruption/lobbyism which would require a legislator to vote against a GDPR like approach. There is no risk to your economy by introducing good data privacy.

Just a rant. India might have its reasons.

Because there will be people for whom any changes would massively affect their ability to do their work/business who would not simply accept something as comprehensive as GDPR.

As the OP article says, even if not perfect, why not start here and make amendments later to tighten things up i.e. something is better than nothing. The real problem is that legislation is glacially slow and expensive to put into law which is good (to stop kneejerk laws) but also bad since it doesn't allow you to pass the 90% that is probably agreed and worry about the sticky bits later.

India doesn't have enough purchasing power to convince big tech companies (Google, Facebook, etc.) to store the data of Indian residents in India. Also, there are not many local tech monoliths with consumer apps to fall back on (like China had).

Since India depends heavily on apps & services by big tech, I doubt such requirements like GDPR has would be enforced. Although the right to ask a website to delete all information about one and so on are quite good and could work.

Did the 2019 bill have any impact on the extant data collection practices?

BRICS countries are going to continue the social credit/aadhar route and the West will watch jealously.

This is nothing against China/India etc., I'm sure their populations do not like the direction either.

How is social credit in PRC in any shape of form comparable to AADHAR (SSN in US)?

"India's dodgy mass surveillance project should concern us all"

"Biometric ID card project Aadhaar links almost every part of a citizen's personal life to a state database"

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/india-aadhaar-biometrics-pri...

It's just a biometric Id system. Europe has one too, its actually very similar to aadhar in scope and usage. In fact the stated reasoning is identical to that of aadhar.

https://blog.hidglobal.com/2021/09/european-union-already-ro...

Though I doubt wired.com would do an article about the draconian European "mass surveillance database".

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