India gets a data protection law

The Digital Personal Data Protection Bill was passed by the Rajya Sabha on August 9

In a significant moment, President Draupadi Murmu gave her assent to the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill on August 11, 2023. This gave India a specific legislation that addresses the protection of a citizen's personal data.

The long-awaited law was passed by the Lok Sabha on August 7 and by the Rajya Sabha on August 9. The legislation specifically addresses citizens' privacy and establishes guidelines on how individuals' data can be used by private or government entities.

Now that the law has been enacted, the government will initiate the rule-making process for the DPDP Law.

If the DPDP law, in its current form, offers a legislative framework, the process of rule-making will be responsible for defining its specific parameters. For example, the existing law stipulates that the government will identify a list of countries to which data transfers are prohibited. The rule-making processes will establish the criteria upon which a country can be designated for inclusion in this data transfer restriction list.

Also read: What the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill means for you

The industry has also started lobbying the government to make the rule-making process open with stakeholder consultations.

A data protection law has been sought by various sections of society ever since the Supreme Court deemed the Right to Privacy as fundamental – with reasonable restrictions – in 2016.

A Personal Data Protection (PDP) Bill was introduced in 2018 and tabled in 2019, after which it was referred to a joint parliamentary committee. The panel studied the bill for two years and presented its report and a modified PDP Bill in December 2021.

But in 2022, the government withdrew the PDP Bill, citing compliance-related reasons and came out with the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill after a few months. The cabinet approved the bill in July, clearing its way to be tabled in the ongoing monsoon session.