Goa strengthens Data Protection Practices across Government Departments
Porvorim, June 8, 2026: As part of a broader series of awareness and capacity-building initiatives on data governance and privacy, a one-day State-level workshop on the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act, 2023, was held today at the Seminar Hall, Secretariat, Porvorim. Under the leadership of Hon’ble Chief Minister of Goa, Dr. Pramod Sawant and Hon’ble ITE&C Minister, Shri Rohan Khaunte, the workshop aimed to enhance awareness, create responsibility and share best practices among Government officials responsible for
handling citizen data.
The workshop was organised by the Department of Information Technology, Electronics & Communications (DITE&C), Government of Goa, in collaboration with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Government of India, through the National e-Governance Division (NeGD). Senior officials and representatives from various State Government departments participated in the programme for a comprehensive day of learning.
The inaugural was held in the presence of Shri. Kabir Shirgaonkar, Director, DITE&C, Smt. Poonam Bharne, Director, Directorate of Prosecution, Dr. Milind Sakhardande, Joint Director, DITE&C, Smt. Sharda Katare, Head SeMT NeGD, along with session speakers Shri. Mohit Kedia, Industry Expert, Smt. Priyanka Sharma, Industry Expert and members from the NeGD team.
Addressing the gathering, Shri Kabir Shirgaonkar, Director, DITE&C, highlighted the growing importance of embedding privacy safeguards into digital governance initiatives. He conveyed that, “Whether we’re training our Konkani large language model through Bhashini, building AI Kosh capabilities, enabling data exchange between departments or deploying AI chatbots and WhatsApp-based citizen services, the principles of consent, purpose limitation, data minimisation and security must be built in by design, not added as an afterthought. The more
data we collect, process and exchange, the more rigorous we must be in discharging our obligations under the DPDP Act. This workshop ensures we recognise our role in safeguarding personal data and embed privacy-conscious practices in our everyday work.”
The workshop featured five comprehensive sessions led by the industry experts. The first session on the DPDP Act, 2023, provided an essential overview of the Act and its regulatory framework, detailing the crucial obligations of Data Fiduciaries. Another session focused on creation of a Data Inventory to handle personal data. It included a live demonstration teaching officials how to accurately identify and categorize data within their organizations.
Session three on ‘Implementing Notice Requirements and Rights Management’ engaged participants on crafting specific, understandable and informed notices for data collection, and covered key data principal rights. The session on ‘Consent Management in Practice – An Industry Perspective’, further broke down the mechanics of consent, focusing on the need for informed consent requests and cookie consent banners. The final session offered participants technical and organisational measures for data protection and driving data privacy awareness within their organisations.
The workshop marks the beginning of a broader capacity-building effort by DITE&C to equip Government departments with the knowledge, tools and frameworks required under the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023. With Goa accelerating initiatives in digital governance, artificial intelligence, citizen service delivery and data-driven decision-making, the Department is ensuring responsible data handling and privacy protection remains central to the State’s digital transformation.
