The Telegraph: New Delhi: Saturday, June 09, 2018.
A group of
lawyers and petitioners fighting the Aadhaar case in the Supreme Court have
drafted an "Indian privacy code", fearing the Data Protection Bill
being drawn up by the Justice B.N. Srikrishna Committee might not adequately
take into account an individual's fundamental right to privacy.
The draft
code was submitted to the committee on Friday and put out for public
consultation through an online medium. The effort is part of a "Save Our
Privacy" movement in an age when data is regarded as "the new
oil" as driver of industry.
Petitioners
have challenged the Aadhaar scheme's constitutionality in the Supreme Court on
the ground that it violates a citizen's privacy, and that the data collected
under the scheme by various agencies is at risk of leaks.
The latest
controversy over Cambridge Analytica, which has been accused of misusing the
private information of tens of millions of Facebook users, has further
confirmed their fears.
The draft
code seeks to set out conditions under which surveillance and interception of
communications may be carried out, and advocates the formation of a
"privacy commission".
It also takes
on board the concerns expressed by RTI activists after the Supreme Court
verdict last year declaring privacy a fundamental right. The activists feared
that the government might cite privacy as a reason for denying information
under the RTI Act.
Apar Gupta,
one of 10 lawyers who drafted the code, told The Telegraph that it states that
individual rights are well served by the Right to Information Act.
"So,
information commissioners should be exempted from interference or control by
the privacy commissioner. Specific and express language should be used for
providing such exemptions and maintaining the independence of information
commissioners."
Last
November, many of those involved in drafting the code and others had urged
Justice Srikrishna to include in the commission eminent citizens who had been
consistent in advocating people's rights.