Although some misinformed and ignorant cyber law observers believe that the IT Act 2008 is a good piece of law yet the Law Ministry of India must remain unaffected and unguided by their claims. The Law Ministry must avoid falling into the traps of the self claimed cyber law experts who are neither lawyers nor have knowledge of cyber law. Further, the Ministry must also not pay much attention to the "bureaucratic alliances and favours to the industry players who are lobbying real hard to make the Information Technology Act, 2000 (IT Act, 2000) a weak piece of legislation.
It would be good idea to consult real and knowledgeable techno-legal experts this time by the Law Ministry. Praveen Dalal, the leading Techno-Legal Expert of India and Managing Partner of Perry4Law opined that the Law Ministry of India would commit a big mistake by approving the present IT Act, 2008. On the contrary he suggested that the Law Ministry must "reformulate the amendments and should come up with the Information Technology Amendment Act, 2009 (IT Act 2009).
The Law Ministry of India has accepted the suggestions of Praveen Dalal regarding introducing IT Act, 2009, strengthening Extradition Law of India to effectively challenge the cyber crimes, including effective provisions regarding cyber war and cyber terrorism in India, International harmonisation of cyber law, providing sound cyber law and cyber security regime in India to encourage foreign direct investment and outsourcing to India, etc.
The IT Act 2009 is expected to be introduced within the next two months during the winter session of the Parliament. Let us hope that we can expect some sensible and effective legislation this time from the Law Ministry and Ministry/Department of Information Technology (DIT) that is neither based upon industry lobbying nor upon the naà ve suggestions of the self claimed cyber law experts and corrupt and ignorant bureaucrats.
