Contemporary Ethical Issues — Ethical Standards

Entry	Year	Description	Impact
DPDP Act, s.44(3)	2023	Section 44(3) of the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 substituted section 8(1)(j) of the Right to Information Act with a clause covering information relating to personal information. The new clause does not reproduce the former clause’s language about public activity and unwarranted invasion of privacy. G.S.R. 843(E), dated 13 November 2025, places this amendment in the group commencing on publication of the notification. Other DPDP provisions have different commencement schedules, so the enactment year alone does not establish when each provision operates.	This creates a concrete contemporary-ethics problem at the boundary of privacy and accountability. In a hypothetical request about a public programme, separate a person’s sensitive details from records showing how public decisions were made. The RTI Act’s section 8(2) provides for access where public interest in disclosure outweighs harm to protected interests, and section 10 addresses reasonably severable non-exempt material. The substituted clause must therefore be considered within the statutory framework. Neither blanket disclosure nor a reflex refusal explains the competing interests; identify the information, legal provision and reasons for the decision.