President Droupadi Murmu on Saturday gave her assent to four bills passed during the Monsoon Session of Parliament, NDTV reported.
The bills that have received the president’s assent are the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill, the Registration of Births and Deaths (Amendment) Bill, the Jan Vishwas (Amendment of Provisions) Bill, and the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Bill.
Of these, two bills – the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill and the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Bill – had faced criticism from Opposition parties and digital privacy activists.
The Data Protection Bill was passed in the Lok Sabha on August 7 and in the Rajya Sabha through a voice vote on August 9.
This was the Centre’s second attempt at framing the legislation for data protection and came after at least three previous iterations that were considered.
The bill lays down obligations on private and government entities around the collection and processing of citizens’ data. It also requires data fiduciaries to obtain consent for processing a citizen’s personal data as a matter of routine and grants the individual the right to access, correct, erase, port, and restrict their data. It proposes a penalty of up to Rs 250 crore on entities for misusing or failing to protect the digital data of individuals.
Several data privacy activists have raised concerns over some of the provisions of the law, saying that data fiduciaries under the law do not have to inform users about the third parties with whom their data will be shared, the duration for which their data will be stored and if their data will be transferred to other countries.
In July, several Opposition MPs had walked out of a Parliamentary Standing Committee meeting to protest against a move to adopt a report in support of the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill. They had claimed that the report was adopted by the panel without proper scrutiny of the bill.
The Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Bill gives the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Central government control over the postings and transfers of bureaucrats in Delhi. It was passed in the Lok Sabha on August 3 and the Rajya Sabha on August 7.
The Centre had promulgated an ordinance on May 19 to create the National Capital Civil Service Authority in order to administer the transfer and posting of bureaucrats serving the Delhi government. The ordinance nullified a Supreme Court verdict passed on May 11 stating that the Aam Aadmi Party government in the national capital has legislative power over bureaucrats in all departments other than public order, police and land.
On August 7, Union Home Minister Amit Shah claimed that the Bill did not violate the Supreme Court judgement. However, Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal accused the Centre of trying to usurp power through the backdoor and of insulting the people of Delhi.
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