THE Indian citizen’s right to privacy is under threat from the increasing efforts to collect data about individuals for various purposes, but there is no specific legislation to regulate any such action. In October last year, a Group of Experts on Privacy (comprising 12 experts) constituted by the Planning Commission under the chairmanship of a former Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court, Ajit Prakash Shah, submitted its report making specific recommendations to the government in order to formulate a suitable framework for a Privacy Act. The group agreed that such a piece of legislation must apply both to the government and the private sector. The report has noted that with the initiation of national programmes such as Unique Identification Number, National Intelligence Grid (NATGRID), Crime and Criminal Tracking Networking Systems (CCTNS), Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY—a health insurance scheme), DNA profiling, privileged communications and brain mapping, most of which will be implemented through ICT (Information, Communication and Technology) platforms, concerns have emerged on their impact on the privacy of persons. The government collects data relating to citizens’ health, travel, taxes, religion, education, financial status, employment, disability, living situation, wealth, citizenship, marriage, crime record, and so on, without an overarching policy. This, according to the report, has led to ambiguity over who is allowed to collect data, what data can be collected, what are the rights of the individual, and how the right to privacy will be protected. The report has further observed that the extent of personal information being held by various service providers, especially the enhanced potential for convergence that digitisation carries with it, is a matter that raises issues about privacy.
Posted on: Mon, 22 Jul 2013 19:27:24 +0000
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