New data protection bill to be introduced in Monsoon session, govt tells SC

Attorney General tells Constitution bench that the bill will meet all concerns expressed by petitioners about personal data protection

The Centre told the Supreme Court on Tuesday that a new data protection bill will be introduced in the Monsoon session of Parliament.

A Constitution bench of Justices K M Joseph, Ajay Rastogi, Aniruddha Bose, Hrishikesh Roy, and C T Ravikumar was hearing the petitions challenging the latest privacy policy of WhatsApp and seeking enforcement of privacy rights in the digitial world.

"It will meet all the concerns expressed by the petitioners about personal data protection," Attorney General R Venkatramani told the bench.

The matter has been posted for hearing in the first week of August 2023. The case has now been placed before Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud as two judges on the bench (Justice Joseph and Justice Rastogi) are to retire this June.

Senior advocate Shyam Divan, appearing for the petitioners, said the court should not link the hearings to the legislative process, which is complex and may be again referred to some committees, causing a delay.

Divan also pointed out that when the matter came up for hearing earlier, the Bench was told that the Bill would be introduced in the Winter Session of the Parliament, but that did not happen.

Responding to this, the AG said, "The consultation process is a continuous process so it went through a very qualified consultation process.”

At the outset, he added, "The Bill is ready. It just has to be introduced in the Parliament. It will be introduced in the Monsoon session in July. I may be considered after that.”

The court was hearing a plea filed by two students — Karmanya Singh Sareen and Shreya Sethi — challenging the contract entered into between WhatsApp and its parent Facebook(now Meta) to provide access to calls, photographs, texts, videos and documents shared by users, saying it is a violation of their privacy and free speech.

Last year(October 14), the court had cleared the path for the Competition Commission of India’s (CCI’s) probe into the messaging platform’s updated privacy policy of 2021.

The SC’s interim order had come on an appeal by WhatsApp and Meta which challenged a Delhi High Court decision that went against the messaging platform. The appeal sought a stay on the CCI probe.

In January last year, the CCI on its own had decided to look into WhatsApp’s updated privacy policy, following news reports.