Panel on personal data protection bill to submit report in Parliament’s Winter Session
1 min read . Updated: 23 Sep 2020, 10:44 PM IST
PremiumThe joint parliamentary committee was expected to submit its report in the Budget session
The Personal Data Protection Bill that seeks to regulate the use of an individual’s data by the government and private companies may take some more time to see the light of day. A joint parliamentary committee (JPC) constituted to examine and study the bill will now get around three more months to submit its report. The JPC, which was constituted in the Lok Sabha in December, was expected to submit its report in the Budget session. After one extension, the committee was asked to submit its report by the second week of the monsoon session of Parliament.
The deadline for the presentation of the report has now been set in the second week of the winter session of the Parliament, according to an official statement. The winter session usually starts in December.
The bill that seeks to protect the privacy of individuals, pertaining to their personal data and lay down norms on accountability of entities processing such data, was cleared by the Cabinet in December 2019. However, it has been criticized on the grounds that it gives unlimited power to the Centre.
“Since the bill is compassionate (towards the needs of citizens) and other countries are also looking forward to this law, the bill should be discussed by a committee comprising members from both houses of the Parliament," IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said last year.
