Personal Data Protection Bill Retracted By Central Government

• Published date: 09 August 2022
• Subject Matter: Privacy, Data Protection
• Law Firm: S.S. Rana & Co. Advocates
• Author: S.S. Rana & Co. Advocates

In a surprising and significant move, the Central Government on August 03, 2022 has withdrawn the much- touted Personal Data Protection Bill from the Lok Sabha, with an assurance that a New legislation entailing data protection provisions will be introduced soon.

The Minister of Railways, Communications and Electronics & Information Technology, Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw in this context remarked that "The Personal Data Protection Bill has been withdrawn because the JCP recommended 81 amendments in a bill of 99 sections. Above that, it made 12 major recommendations. Therefore, the bill has been withdrawn and a new bill will be presented."

Since, its very inception, the Data Protection Bill has been a subject of cacophonous debate and its provisions have invited myriad views from various stakeholders, including Tech giants like Meta Platforms, Google, Apple .

Reportedly, the Tech giants, earlier this year had inter alia recommended in a letter sent to the Minister, the inclusion of non-personal data and renaming of Bill as Data Protection Bill instead of Personal Data Protection Bill, restrictions on cross-border data transfers, data localization obligations and mandatory hardware/IOT and AI software certifications. The tech giants had also suggested to invite additional stakeholder consultations before introducing the impugned Bill .

Personal Data Protection Bill of 2019

The Personal Data Protection Bill of 2019 was introduced in the Lok Sabha in December, 2019 and was prepared and modelled by an expert group headed by...