We wrote to the Secretary of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) urging them to provide adequate and sufficient time for the public consultation process for the forthcoming draft rules under the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 (“DPDPA, 2023”). We sent this letter in light of some reporting around the finalisation of the 21 draft rules under the DPDPA, 2023, its imminent release, and the 45-day public consultation. We wrote to them in concern about such a short time frame being insufficient to understand, analyse, and meaningfully respond to the draft rules. We also urged them to reduce frictions in the consultation process and make it as open, accessible, and democratic as possible.
It is worth noting that the Ministry invited feedback and public comments on the draft Digital Personal Data Protection Bill, 2022 for 30 days. Where on one hand the Ministry provided stakeholders an entire month to send comments on a bill that was only 24 pages long, on the other it is considering a mere 45-day public consultation period for 21 draft rules for a key piece of legislation.
Read the letter to MeitY dated November 09, 2023 here.