Development and Democracy

This paper, 'Digital Industrialisation in Developing Countries: A Review of the Business and Policy Landscape', developed for the Commonwealth Secretariat, London, examines, the nature of digital economy in a developing country context, focussing the study partly on Bengaluru, often called the Silicon Valley of the South. It distinguishes…

In the light of Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) releasing recommendations on Net Neutrality, this article by Anita Gurumuthy discusses the significance of TRAI recommendations.  TRAI’ s stand presents a contrast to US government’s decision to roll back net neutrality. When Internet access is already not equal, revoking net…

Gurumurthy wrote an article 'Use of Information Technology in promoting transparency' in elections, in the Common Cause publication.

The nine-judge bench of India’s Supreme Court has just ruled that “privacy is intrinsic to freedom of life and personal liberty” guaranteed in Article 21 of the Constitution of India and qualifies as “a primal natural right”. In this article, Anita Gurumurthy and Nandini Chami reflect on how this judgement is only a beginning. The de facto…

We have been actively engaging with the debate on privacy and data protection in India, that has gained traction in the context of the unique citizen ID/ Aadhaar project of the government. Through our media articles, we have emphasised the public value of privacy, bringing in an agency perspective to the debate. We have also foregrounded the…

'Digital Democracy in India' is our ongoing attempt to examine the emergence of a new governance paradigm in the country, characterized by the rise of ‘governance by networks’ and ‘rule by data’, from the standpoint of inclusive citizenship. We are primarily concerned with tracing critical directions for institutional overhaul, so that the…

In 2017, the Heinrich Böll Foundation (HBF) commissioned IT for Change to undertake a research study critically analysing the government's Digital India programme, assessing the key gaps and opportunities for gender equality in relation to the programme and recommending a strategic action plan in this regard.

The mandate of the study…

Data protection in India is a fragile concept, heavily reliant on one sided user contracts between corporations and citizens. Read our article on First Post, to know more about how corporation defined 'Terms of Use' have come to dictate users' right to privacy in the glaring absence of legislative protections around data.

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Parminder Jeet Singh was invited by the Centre for Policy Studies, IIT Bombay to deliver a talk on 'Digital Data - The New Raw Material in the Globalising Economy' as part of the Development Discourse Series. In the talk, Parminder unpacks data collection, use, and regulation from a political economy perspective; and also delves into the…

As the Supreme Court finds itself in the midst of a heated debate on privacy, Parminder Jeet Singh muses on the implications for a citizen oriented right to privacy in the digital age in The Hindu.