The industry and legal experts, who had dubbed as `Draconian' Clause 73 which was introduced by the parliamentary standing committee on science and technology as an amendment to the bill, welcomed whole-heartedly the Government's decision to drop the same.

The amendments were dropped after the Government came under fire from the opposition-led by the Congress party and faced severe criticism from the industry, including Nasscom.

The much-awaited bill is likely to be passed after a short debate on Tuesday as the minister of information technology Pramod Mahajan is understood to be `very keen' to see it through within this session of Parliament before he embarks on a high-profile visit to the US on May 18. The budget session of Parliament ends on May 17.

The controversial provision came in for attack by the Opposition in the Lok Sabha on Monday even as information technology minister Pramod Mahajan appealed for its passage in view of a detailed study having already been done by the standing committee.

Even Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's short intervention that the House could take as much time as possible to discuss the bill hardly satisfied the opposition benches which alleged that some of the provisions contained in the bill were `Draconian' in nature. There was no need to pass the measure in a hurry, they insisted.

In his intervention, Vajpayee responded that his knowledge of IT was `limited', but he knew that the Bill was important as also complicated.Industry is now waiting with bated breath for the bill to become a law as it is widely expected a major phillip to e-commerce activity in the country.``We expect that e-commerce will now get a tremendous impetus with the IT bill becoming a reality and be a Rs 2500 crore activity by year-end. Hence, it is imperative that the Bill is passed at the earliest. We also welcome the decision to drop clause 73 as it would have virtually closed down cyber cafes and made even a 10-year-old liable for prosecution,'' said Nasscom president Dewang Mehta.

FICCI president GP Goenka also welcomed the move to drop Clause 73 and added that ``in practice, if any of the security measures are found to be harsh or transgressing into the privacy of individuals, corrective measures have to be taken. Policing cyber laws with excess powers will be counter-productive.''

Welcoming the introduction of the bill, MAIT president Hemant Bharat Ram, however, felt that the government should have also dropped Clause 79 which pertains to arrest of a person by a police official above the rank of a DSP if he feels that a cyber crime is about to be committed.

``How is a policeman equipped to judge whether a cyber crime is to be committed? This can act as a stumbling block in creating the right atmosphere for e-commerce. A better mechanism involving a more qualified body should have been evolved. However, once the law is operational, amendments can be brought in,'' said Bharat Ram.

Cyber law consultant and Cyberlaws.net president Pavan Duggal echoed similar views and opined that such provisions were against the grain of the constitution basic fundamental rights. ``The government would have done better to drop them as most of these seek to give too much powers to police officials unnecessarily without much room for legal remedy to the person accused of cyber crime. Moreover, have you ever heard of a crime being committted in a public place?'' commented Duggal.

However, the industry was unanimous on e-commerce getting a big boost. ``With digital documents becoming legal, it will reduce the cost and speed of transactions. The industry will be quick to adopt e-transactions, but the challenge may lie in the government and departments in taking up e-commerce and e-governance,'' pointed out Bharat Ram.