At the IAMAI India Digital Summit yesterday, MP Baijant "Jay" Panda spoke about what he expects from a privacy bill, and his views on Aadhaar. (Sometimes paraphrased) Excerpts from his discussion with Chetan Krishnaswamy, Country Head (Public Policy) of Google India: On Aadhaar "I've been engaged with Aadhaar for a dozen years, initially asking tough questions to Nandan [Nilekani] and others, and then a proponent of it. We've had increasing digitisation and violation of privacy,and so it made sense that I champion privacy. Too often the debate is black or white. Either you're pro-privacy or pro-aadhaar. In the 21st century, we have to make some concessions, but that should not be wanton or casual, and it should be defined by consent and the law." "On the ground, I see the humongous abuse of, say enlisting school children on aadhaar. I've been doing a quarterly review, and every review has shown a huge number of fake schools with bills for uniforms, mid day meals [and other entitlements]. Deduplication is what aadhaar does best. Most of which has been claimed as breach is not biometric data but someones aadhaar number has been leaked. We should take, steps like, they go further about making aadhaar more secure. We shouldn't get cocky that it shouldn't be breach, but we shouldn't create a panic situation that it should be done away with." On the Srikrishna Committee "It's good that we have a public dialogue now. There was no public discussion in case of IT Act…
