1st Consultation Held on Draft DPDP Rules

Questions about consent and data localisation were among the key concerns raised at the government's first consultation meeting with industry representatives on draft Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Rules 2025 on Tuesday, with Union minister Ashwini Vaishnaw promising "very extensive" and "focussed" deliberations to balance regulation and innovation.

- Aditi Agrawal

NEW DELHI:

"About 350 stakeholders attended the first consultation session on DPDP rules. Excellent suggestions. This will be followed by series of focussed discussions," Vaishnaw posted on X.

Stakeholders from different sectors - social media, e-commerce, banks, payments companies, insurance companies, conglomerates, telecom - attended the consultation in New Delhi in the presence of Vaishnaw and IT secretary S Krishnan. The rules are key to bringing into effect the DPDP Act that was notified in August 2023.

People aware of the matter said: "During the meeting, Vaishnaw indicated that the consultations could exceed by 15 days." As processing of children's data remains the key concern, a stakeholder mentioned that the proposed rules around verifiable parental consent (VPC) create an "unintentional data moat" that benefits established, larger platforms that can use existing data to determine who is a child.