Before Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced the 21-day nationwide lockdown, we spoke to Member of Parliament Amar Patnaik, who is on the Joint Parliamentary Committee on the Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019. Patnaik argued that any Data Protection Authority (DPA) which is formed should be independent, perhaps through constitutional backing. Citing the large amount of people who would be impacted by the bill, Patnaik said that a wider cross-section of people — especially at the municipal and rural levels — should be consulted before the Data Protection Bill is passed. Here's the entire interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ud3UPjaorE Edited excerpts from the interaction follow. Constitution of DPA: "My personal view is that the bill could have done a better job of it, in the sense that the selection of the people who will be in the DPA is still amorphous. The usual lines of who are the people could be there in the regulators' guidelines is that people should be from law or administration background. So that will not apply here. The people who should be manning the DPA should be from a cross section of internet users. Which should be citizens or citizen representatives, companies, government officials... I believe there's an over-dependence on the government officials deciding on how this should pan out by being part of the data protection authority, which is not really right. That's my personal view". Constitution of DPA must include citizens: "What is important is that someone who takes interest in this, has a fair idea of…
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