New personal data protection bill under preparation: Central government to Supreme Court

The Central government on Thursday told a Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court that a new bill towards data privacy and protection is being framed by the government [Karmanya Singh Sareen v. Union of India]..Solicitor General (SG) Tushar Mehta made the submission before a bench of Justices KM Joseph, Ajay Rastogi, Aniruddha Bose, Hrishikesh Roy and CT Ravikumar in the case concerning WhatsApp’s privacy policy and its users' right to privacy under Article 21."It is our stand that Indians cannot be discriminated as against the same users of the WhatsApp. Bill drafting is ongoing which is a legislative process," the SG submitted. He, therefore, requested the Court to defer the hearingJustice Joseph then remarked that the Court cannot wait for too long given the importance of issue, and if the Central government was keen it would have already brought in a law. "If you were keen you would have brought a legislation," said Justice Joseph. "Another bill is under preparation, earlier one was withdrawn," the SG replied.The Lok Sabha in August this year had approved by a voice-vote a motion to withdraw the the Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019 (PDP Bill) prepared by Justice Srikrishna committee.This was pursuant to the new recommendations made by the Joint Parliamentary Committee ..The Court recorded the SG's submission and posted the case for consideration next on January 17, 2023. .The petitioners had initially moved the Delhi High Court challenging the 2016 privacy policy of WhatsApp. The Delhi High Court had on September 23, 2016 granted partial relief stating that the data of those WhatsApp Users who delete WhatsApp before the 2016 policy came into effect - cannot be used for any purposes as laid down in the 2016 privacy policy.The said decision then came to be challenged before Supreme Court since the High Court granted only partial relief.The Supreme Court, in April 2017, referred the matter to a Constitution Bench.Later when the Constitution Bench took up the case, it was kept pending after the Court was informed that Justice BN Srikrishna led committee was preparing a Data Protection Bill.Subsequently, WhatsApp updated its user policy on January 4, 2021.