DNA bill can lead to caste/community based profiling: Owaisi, Viswam

AIMIM (All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen) president Asaddudin Owaisi and CPI chief Binoy Viswam have filed dissent notes to the Parliamentary Standing Committee’s report on DNA Technology (Use and Application) Regulation Bill 2019, claiming that it doesn’t keep in mind their issues over privateness violations and targets Dalit, Muslims and Adivasis by means of DNA pattern assortment and indefinite storage as per the brand new laws.

The Standing Committee on Science and Technology, headed by Congress chief Jairam Ramesh, is scheduled to meet on February 1 to talk about and undertake the ultimate report. The bill proposes DNA sampling and profiling of residents accused of crime or reported lacking and storing their distinctive genetic info for administrative functions. The concern is that the regulation could possibly be used for caste or neighborhood based profiling.

“It is most regrettable that, while the finalised Draft Report recognises the potential dangers of indexing the DNA profiles of non- convicts, especially convicts and suspects, it has still retained these objectionable provisions,” Mr. Owaisi stated in his dissent be aware. The crime information confirmed that the Indian legal justice system disproportionately incarcerated Dalits, Muslims and Adivaşis. With this bill, this focused discrimination could be encoded into the regulation, he noticed.

The bill ran afoul with the requirements that had been set within the Puttaswamy and Subramanian Swamy judgements of the Supreme Court. “In the absence of a statutory framework protecting the right to privacy, this bill will cause irreversible damage to individuals’ right to privacy as well as the criminal justice system,” he acknowledged.

The bill wouldn’t be a panacea to the issues of an insufficient legal justice system, he harassed. Here, he flagged the instance of the United Kingdom, the place the variety of crimes solved by DNA proof had been lowering regardless that the variety of profiles within the system was going up.

Mr. Owaisi argued that the bill can’t come into place with no sturdy information safety regulation. “A statutory protection for private data is critical because it provides a mechanism for enforcement of rights, grievance redressal and independent oversight. When the data being collected is as sensitive as DNA, it requires additional protections,” he wrote.

Jairam Ramesh clarifies

Mr. Ramesh has countered Mr. Owaisi’s issues. In a letter to Mr. Owaisi, which is part of the report, he stated the target of the bill was not overarching however restricted to the institution of a regulatory board to regulate using DNA know-how in consonance with worldwide requirements.

Mr. Ramesh differed with Mr. Owaisi’s argument on attainable privateness violations by the bill and identified that even eminent jurists had been divided on the difficulty. More safeguards ought to be added, he stated “as we gain further experience with the use of technology”.

On the query of a knowledge privateness bill earlier than the DNA bill, he stated, “frankly I do not see the connection since that Bill deals with a different universe of data. You also suggest that the Data Protection Authority proposed in the Private Data Protection Bill should have oversight over the DNA Regulatory Board in the case of other regulators. One regulator cannot oversee another.”

Mr. Viswam too raised comparable issues. In his dissent be aware, he stated, “Without adequate statutory safeguard to protect against the opacity of the law on the sort of information being collected and its unrestricted usage for a variety of purposes this law is susceptible to future misuse and abuse.” The impression that this regulation would have on Dalit, Adivasis and non secular & gender minority was such that he couldn’t assist it, he added.

The DNA Technology (Use and Application) Regulation Act, 2019, that has been in works for 15 years now. Nearly 60 international locations have enacted comparable laws, with the U.S. bringing in regulation way back to 1994.