This has been a season of controversies in Parliament. While the amendment to the Citizenship Act and the updating of Nepal's political map dominated public discourse, a sinister plan to curb individual freedom of citizens through another bill unfolded quietly in Parliament. Having made it way through the Upper House, the Nepal Special Service Bill has now been stuck in the Lower House. Among other things, the bill has a provision that allows intelligence officials to intrude into the privacy of any individual in the country without seeking permission from the court.

As per Clause 10 of the bill, 'audio or audiovisual conversations at the individual or institutional level that are suspicious can be kept under surveillance, monitored or intercepted’. The government deems it necessary to control acts of 'secession, espionage, sabotage and subversion' and to 'protect national sovereignty, national integrity and communal harmony'. In principle, the government’s logic does not sound that bad. But in reality, the provision ends up creating a surveillance state. Rather than curbing crimes, a surveillance state is more interested in putting political dissidents and rights activists under constant watch. This means the curtailing of political rights and freedoms of individuals.

There’s no dearth of reports that show how surveillance equipment such as CCTV cameras increase people’s sense of anxiety and help create a surveillance state rather than making society more secure. Even the presence of CCTV cameras around us is enough to make us feel that our actions are being recorded and analysed, notwithstanding the fact that those actions might be as trivial as drinking a cup of tea or reading a book. A surveillance state gives a free hand to intelligence officials to keep watch on any individual and institution and intrude into their privacy, effectively breaching the constitutional rights to privacy on many levels. The suspicion that authorities might be watching our activities secretly is enough to cripple us psychologically.

The bill underway in Parliament does more than just that: it gives the intelligence agency the authority to record and listen to telephone conversations and intercept messages to use them as evidence against an individual. Although the bill has a provision of seven years of imprisonment for authorities who misuse the information to target individuals, the idea of victims being able to take legal action against the authorities sounds like a far-fetched dream.