Congress promises to protect digital rights of citizens

In a first, Congress in its manifesto has assured digital rights of every citizen under the right to privacy. The party says it believes that every Indian shall enjoy digital rights and be able to freely access the digital world.

The party has also linked the digital rights with the right to privacy.

The manifesto said the party will pass a law to protect the personal data of all persons and uphold the right to privacy.

Further, the party will also pass a law to provide adequate safeguards against unlawful or excessive surveillance and monitoring, and provide for both independent and Parliamentary oversight.

The party will also make all government departments publish all non-private data sets as open data, allowing citizens to access the data without having to file RTI applications.

In order to protect digital rights of citizens, the party will provide access to all persons to high quality internet at affordable rates and it will also uphold the principle of net neutrality.

The party promises to "promote the development and use of open standard and free and open source software in order to enable citizens to avail government information without being obliged to rely on proprietary software."

--IANS

sumit/prs