Spokesperson: Shri Gaurav Gogoi: He said that it is a really important issue. In the last session, when the Parliament was in session, the INDIA alliance parties deliberated on the recently passed Digital Data Protection Act. I would briefly go into it-a JPC was setup and extensive report was presented and subsequently the government, as it has the habit, when it is going to pass the bills, brings certain amendments which have fundamentally changed the nature of the JPC report.

Subsequently, during the recent Lok Sabha session, civil society also reached out to various INDIA alliance parties’ leaders. One of the group of civil society activists, RTI activists, and privacy activists also reached out to LoP Shri Rahul Gandhi Ji and then it was subsequently decided that all of us together will convey the important concerns expressed by the civil society to the Minister of Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnav ji through a collective petition and we have made a joint petition. The most important thing in this joint petition is that the Digital Data Protection Act has ripped apart the Right to Information Act passed in the Parliament of India. It says that if any such information has been sought in the Right to Information application, which has no connection with public interest, then it is not mandatory to provide such information.

We will send this petition to the ministry and we hope that the government will seriously consider it. We recommend that the government repeal Section 44(3). By doing this, the original bill on digital data protection will not be affected much, but the spirit of the Right to Information Act passed by the Parliament will be saved.

Our thinking is that citizens have rights and it is the duty of the government to protect those rights. But the current BJP government’s view is the opposite. They feel that all the rights are with the government because they have won the election. Thursday, April 10, 2025