A three-day national council meet of the Communist Party of India (CPI) has expressed concern on the National Digital Health Mission (NDHM) which it said suggests a framework that “severely overlaps with the fundamental right to privacy.”

Releasing the resolutions adopted at the meet, CPI General Secretary D Raja said the NDHM is short on details about how sensitive medical records will be secured.

“Specifically, it does not align fully with the privacy principles recommended by the Group of Experts on Privacy (Justice A P Shah Committee) and the more recent, Justice B N Srikrishna Committee report whose recommendations on data protection form the core foundation for the draft Personal Data Protection Bill, 2018,” the resolution says.

The opt-out mechanism also appears to be flawed, as a person’s record isn’t erased if they are opt-out, but instead simply locked, the CPI meet said. Data leakage is another serious threat, which needs to be addressed robustly.

Discussing the recent developments in Manipur, the CPI national council said the people of Manipur have been experiencing a very disturbing problem of extortion and forced tax collection by the underground outfits even under the very nose of the Army and Police.

Condemning the killings of farmers in Lakhimpur Kheri in Uttar Pradesh, the National Council demanded the arrest of the culprits and announced protests across the country from 4-11 October. The party has demanded to scrap three farm laws passed by Parliament and kept on hold by the government for 18 months.

Demanding the withdrawal of the National Monetisation Pipeline, the CPI meet said its implementation would have an adverse impact on employment generation, reservation policy, price level, and availability of goods and services to the common people at a reasonable price.

The CPI National Council has voiced its serious concern about difficulties in education faced by most rural and economically and socially backward students as most of them are unable to participate in online education, and offline education is not taking place.

The party has demanded that smartphones or tablets or laptops along with Wi-Fi facilities must be provided to students in all areas, educational institutes, and community centres.

As soon as possible, all students must be vaccinated and education activities should be resumed physically, the party said.

CPI’s next Party Congress, the 24th Congress of the Party, will be held from 14 to 18, October 2022 at Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh.