Personal Data Protection Bill

In news- The Union government has recently withdrawn the Personal Data Protection Bill from Parliament to replace it with a new bill with a ‘comprehensive framework’ and ‘contemporary digital privacy laws.

Reasons for withdrawing the bill-

The Bill 2019 was deliberated in great detail by the Joint Committee of Parliament. 81 amendments were proposed and 12 recommendations were made towards a comprehensive legal framework on the digital ecosystem.
Hence, in the circumstances, it is proposed to withdraw ‘The Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019’ and present a new Bill that fits into the comprehensive legal framework.”
The Bill was also seen as being too “compliance intensive” by startups of the country.
According to government sources, the revamped Bill will be much easier to comply with, especially for startups.

About the bill-

The PDP bill was first introduced in Lok Sabha on December 11, 2019.
A data protection law for India has been in the works since 2018, when a panel led by Justice Srikrishna, a retired judge of the Supreme Court, drew up a draft version of a Bill.
The bill was referred to the Joint Parliamentary Committee, which tabled its report in Lok Sabha on December 16, 2021.
The committee proposed a single law for dealing with both personal and non-personal datasets.
The report was also under dispute as it suggested moving towards complete localisation of data.
The withdrawn Bill had proposed restrictions on the use of personal data without the explicit consent of citizens.
It had also sought to provide the government with powers to give exemptions to its probe agencies from the provisions of the Act, a move that was strongly opposed by the opposition MPs who had filed their dissent notes.