A new draft of the Data Protection Bill is being worked on: Meity

Dr Rajendra Kumar, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (Meity), said that digital makeover across government, industries, and MSMEs is at varying levels of maturity and the challenge to be addressed is reducing costs and scaling up through tech adoption. He said this while speaking at the CII International Technology Summit 2022 ‘Technology 4.0 Adoption, Adaptation & Enterprise Transformation: The Next Big Leap’,

“The government has put in place the long-term vision and has a proactive approach to deal with emerging tech and subsequent threat levels. Modern set of cyber laws serve the needs, and the new draft is being worked on for Data Protection Bill to augment efficient usage of data with confidence that data would be protected while allowing that data may be used by the industry,” Dr Kumar said. 

Focusing on the importance of digital transformation and the caution required, Ms Sharmistha Dasgupta, Deputy Director General (Scientist-G), National Informatics Centre, said: “There will always be use and misuse with calls for the need for regulation. The data or information can be used for polarizing opinions, manipulating public perception, spreading disinformation, hate speech etc. However, tech enhancement is required to live smarter, productive, and enhance outcomes in a conducive environment.”

Emphasizing that sustainability is a significant signpost of this industrial revolution fuelled by technological advancements, Vijay Rai, Chairman, CII Delhi Panel on Technology, said: “Indian economy is predominantly agrarian, and farmer distress may be addressed by way of tech such as GPS, GIS, location, satellite data analysis. Also, the country can achieve better healthcare accessibility through digital connectivity; remote sensing, GIS, GPS, Sat communication can help in disaster management and risk mitigation.”

During the session on ‘Leveraging intelligent & smart automation as a catalyst for enterprise transformation: AI, Data Analytics, IoT, AR/VR and deep technologies’, Biswajit Bhattacharya, Partner & Automotive Industry Leader India, South Asia, IBM India Pvt Limited, said: “The organizations that adopt AI have performed better financially across industries and sectors. A global leader implemented an AI supply chain solution to synthesize supply chain data along with COVID data and logistics data from the government. Areas of disconnect are untapped data, and the challenge to identify/extract value out of it.” 

In the session, the discussions were held on AI and ML as a backbone for creating and delivering exceptional scale and value, smart automation and industry 4.0 applications that drive business value chain transformation and productivity gains. Sachin Agarwal, Head AI, Sony India, was of the view that it is impossible to replace human intelligence with AI, but it enhances decision making and fastens the processes.”