Data safety panel likely to finalise report in 2 weeks

The Justice BN Srikrishna Committee on data protection is likely to submit its report to the government in the next two weeks. According to key officials, the ten-member committee is likely to meet at least one more time before finalising the report, which is being keenly awaited for its recommendations on issues such as data localisation.

“I expect that it would take at least one more meeting or a couple more to finalise the report,” said an official privy to the discussions. The person added that the idea is to get consensus from all members on the issues which were ahead of the committee.

Earlier the union minister for electronics and IT, Ravi Shankar Prasad had indicated that he expects the report to be finalised by end of June this year.


Another person aware of the matter said that the report should be finished within the next 10-15 days as former Supreme Court judge BN Srikrishna has also been appointed to investigate various allegations of impropriety against ICICI Bank.

In November last year, the committee had released a whitepaper seeking comments on the various aspects of the data protection regime under its consideration.

The committee has identified seven principles for the data protection law, which include technology agnosticism, where it states that the data protection law must be flexible to include changing technologies, data minimisation stating that data sought and processed must be minimal and as necessary, and informed consent.

The other principles include accountability of data controller, penalties for wrongful processing and enforcement of data protection framework by a statutory authority.

ET had reported last month that the committee is likely to recommend that Internet companies such as Google and Facebook store data of Indians within the country but with riders that may restrict the mandate to sensitive personal information.