India First

Reforming surveillance in India In an article published in The Hindu earlier this week, the author (a lawyer) argues the case against telephone and electronic surveillance in India as it exists today, because according to him, its approvals are opaque, and grounds for surveillance are "vague and ambiguous". He's also suggested that the approval in its existing form is a formality, and has suggested decentralisation of approvals for surveillance from Executive to Judiciary, surveillance requests mandating a documented "probable cause for suspicion" and lastly, a lawyer representing the case of target for surveillance without his/her knowledge. Though well-intended, his suggestions of reform to the current approach to surveillance sound idealistic. Based on figures from a single RTI (Right to Information) query, he's of the view that the 250 or so surveillance requests approved daily in India may not be scrutinised by the authority. Given that not a...

Of Bhakts and Bhakti Movements in Indian politics, when The Gods and Goddesses are all too Human Edited: 28-Oct-18 As most Indians would know, bhakti means devotion to God. The Bhakti Movement, which has its origin in Medieval India, was characterised by complete surrender of oneself to God, the love of a selfless devotee or bhakt . According to an insightful article on Bhakti Movement, “Bhakti poets emphasized surrender to god”. Let’s shift to a different world – that of post-Independence politics in India. Indian politics witnessed a landmark development in May 2014. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) secured power in the Lok Sabha election with a clear majority – a feat not achieved by any government since 1984, and never by any party other than the Indian National Congress (INC). Between the elections of 2009 and 2014, there was a generational shift within the BJP – a generation of politicians who had been its most prominent face since it was formed in 1980, and befo...

Data Protection Framework – India In July 2017 the Government of India formed a committee of experts to draft the country’s first Data Protection Framework. This committee was headed by Justice BN Srikrishna. Among its members were Aruna Sundararajan, Secretary, Department of Telecom, Ajay Bhushan CEO, Unique Identification Authority of India, Gulshan Rai, National Cyber Security Coordinator and Arghya Sengupta, Research Director, Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy. The last is a   think tank which was instrumental in drafting of the Aadhaar Act as well as the Bankruptcy Code.  According to the government order, the terms of reference of the committee include, "To make specific suggestions for consideration of the Central Government on principles to be considered for data protection in India and suggest a draft data protection bill". The office memorandum also said that "The Government of India is cognizant of the growing importance of data protection in India. The need...

To DeMo or Not to DeMo – An Ordinary Indian’s Perspective 08 November 2016 will be remembered in independant India’s history for a long time. It was the day when a few hours before midnight, Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared the Indian rupee’s two largest denomination notes – 500 and 1000 – to be made invalid at midnight, with the 500 rupee note replaced with a new one and the 1000 rupee note to be discontinued altogether. Possibly intended for an international audience, it was the Prime Minister’s first address in English on Indian TV channels. This demonetisation of commonly used, high denomination notes would’ve sent shock waves to the sections of India’s business community preferring to conduct most of their transactions with unaccounted for cash. Not just them, the least well off sections of society were also put under great stress in subsequent months because their daily wages and day to day expenses were dependant entirely on cash. No survey had been carried out...