Directing AI for better and smarter legislation
Published in The Hindu: https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/directing-ai-for-better-and-smarter-legislation/article66718048.ece
Artificial Intelligence is attracting the attention of entrepreneurs, political leaders, and policymakers worldwide. Most mature democratic countries are now using AI tools for making better legislations and Parliamentary procedures. AI tools can assist Parliamentarians in preparing responses for legislators, enhancing the research quality, obtaining information about any bills, preparing briefs, providing information on particular house rules, legislative drafting, amendments, interventions, etc. It can also empower Legislators to make informed decisions by having access to insights on citizen grievances, media opinions, and voices of citizen-centric associations.
For AI to work in India, we first need to codify our laws. The challenges with current laws is they are opaque, complex and there is a huge translation gap between law-making, law-implementing and law-interpreting organizations. The Indian Government has done a great job with the India Code Portal, but it can’t be entirely relied on as a ‘single source of truth’. The interface should contain a complete chain right from the parent Act to the subordinate Legislations passed by the Central Government and the amendment notifications, enabling any entity to get a 360° view. The requirement of this becomes more critical in special situations like COVID-19. The Central Government issued over 900 notifications on measures related to COVID-19, and State governments issued over 6,000 notifications on the subject (Data as on September 20, 2020).
We need to make laws machine-consumable with a Central Law Engine, which can be a single source of truth for all acts, subordinate legislations, gazettes, compliances, and regulations. For example: AI can tell us if an entrepreneur wants to open a manufacturing unit in the State of Maharashtra and what acts and compliances apply to it. If a citizen wants to check the eligibility for welfare schemes, AI can recommend which schemes are eligible based on details provided by citizens.
Compared to western democratic nations, in India, Parliamentarians manage constituencies with a huge population. AI can analyze citizens’ grievances and social media responses and flag issues and priorities that need immediate attention. It can also assist Parliamentarians in seeking citizen inputs for public consultation of laws and preparing a manifesto.
Many Parliaments across the world are now actively experimenting with AI-powered assistants. The US House of Representatives has introduced an AI tool to automate the process of analysing differences between bills, amendments and current laws. This immensely helps the legislative staff to more readily see the impacts of amendatory provisions contained in bills that they move through the legislative process. The Netherlands House of Representatives implemented the “Speech2Write” system which converts voice to text and also “translates” voice into written reports. As per the Inter-Parliamentary Union, “Speech2Write comprises automatic speech recognition and automated editing capabilities that can remove filler words, make grammatical corrections and propose editing decisions.” Japan’s AI tool assists in the preparation of responses for its legislature and also helps in the automatic selection of relevant highlights of parliamentary debates. Brazil has developed an AI system called Ulysses which supports transparency and citizen participation. The good news is that India is also innovating and working towards making parliamentary activities more initiatives like ‘One Nation, One Application’ and The National E-Vidhan (NeVA) portal.
AI can also simulate the potential effects of laws. For example, suppose we can model various datasets like the Census, data on household consumption, taxpayers, beneficiaries from various schemes, and public infrastructure. In that case, AI can uncover potential outcomes of a policy. And at the same time, it can also help in flagging laws that require amendment and are outdated in the present circumstances. For example, we all saw how ‘The Epidemic Diseases Act, 1897’ failed to address the COVID-19 pandemic situation badly when the deadly virus ambushed the country. Not just this, many other various IPC provisions are controversial and redundant. According to Article 309 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), attempted suicide continues to be a criminal offense. We have many criminal legislations currently in force that were enacted more than 100 years ago and are of hardly any use today. Many other laws which have not been amended for long include the Press and Registration of Books Act, 1867, the Public Gambling Act, 1867, the Prisons Act, 1894, etc.
The COVID-19 pandemic has given a strong thrust to the Digital India initiative and digitization of services. This momentum needs to be further utilized in the field of law, policy-making, and parliamentary activities, harnessing the power of AI. While doing all this, it needs to be ensured that the use of AI must be encouraged in an open, transparent, and citizen-friendly manner. AI is a powerful tool, but at the end of the day, we should be mindful of the fact that it is a means to an end and not an end in itself.
