Supreme Court Reserves Judgment On PIL To Make e-KYC Process Accessible For Acid Attack Survivors & Persons With Blindness/Low Vision

The Supreme Court on Tuesday(January 28) reserved judgment on the two writ petitions seeking directions or guidelines for persons with blindness/low vision and acid attack survivors, respectively, to conduct digital Know Your Customer (KYC)/e-KYC/video KYC.A bench of Justices J.B. Pardiwala and R. Mahadevan heard the two petitions. It directed the parties to file written submissions that address the following: 1. Guidelines of the Reserve Bank of India 2. Deficiency and loopholes in those guidelines and 3. Suggestions/Recommendations to make it more meaningful. As per the brief hearing that took place, Senior Advocate V.V. Giri (for one of the Respondent authorities) stated that for digital KYC, blinking is required which may not be possible for acid victim-survivors. Therefore, it was suggested that they could move their faces so that the KYC could capture their live details. However, the Counsel of the first petitioner stated that even that is not possible.As for the second petition, the Advocate Ila Sheel argued that for now, there are no mandatory accessibility standards, which is a requirement under Rule 15 of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Rules, 2017, but only advisories.She also pointed out that for persons with blindness and low vision, the impediment in terms of accessibility remains throughout. When Justice Pardiwala asked if there was any bank officer who was there to help them, Ila responded that prompting was not allowed. She added that this is also one of the reasons why often persons with blindness and low vision face rejection in their KYC procedure. The Court reserved the judgment and added that parties must assist to make sure that adequate guidelines are there. For context, in the first petition, the guidelines were sought for an inclusive KYC process for acid attack survivors and persons with permanent eye damage. Directions have been sought from Central authorities for framing appropriate guidelines providing for alternative methods to conduct the Digital KYC/e-KYC process for acid attack survivors suffering from permanent eye disfigurement or eye burns, with the view to make the Digital KYC/e-KYC process more accessible and inclusive towards all disabled persons, particularly acid attack survivors.The petitioner prayed that the Centre clarifies the meaning and interpretation of 'Live Photograph' as mentioned in the Reserve Bank of India(RBI) – KYC Master Directions, 2016 for conducting the Digital KYC/e-KYC and suitable alternatives be framed for this 'live photograph' considering the challenges faced by acid attack survivors and those with permanent eye-disfigurement.In the second petition is filed by Advocate Amar Jain, who is 100% blind. The petitioner has raised the issue that he regularly suffers from various KYC formalities online due to a lack of accessible identification methods for conducting the KYC process digitally. It is stated that the current KYC process involves taking a selfie, signing with pen & paper, putting a signature on screen using mouse, printing and rescanning or clicking photos of filled up form, extremely short duration of OTPs, etc which remains inaccessible for persons with disabilities. Therefore, violates the provisions of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016 and the Constitution of India.The petition seeks to ensure accessibility and reasonable accommodation in accessing financial, telecom services and government schemes by persons with disabilities specifically blindness/low vision. The Court issued notice in this writ petition on January 21 and tagged it with another writ petition (Pragya Prasun & Ors v. UOI) currently being heard by the same bench. Case Details: AMAR JAIN v UNION OF INDIA AND ORS., W.P.(C) No. 49/2025 & PRAGYA PRASUN VS. UNION OF INDIA W.P.(C) No. 289/ 2024Appearances: Siddharth Luthra, Sr. Adv (Petitioner) & Ramesh Babu M. R., AOR; Ankur Sood, AOR; Brijender Chahar, A.S.G.; (Respondents) [Pragya's petition] & Advocate Ila Sheel [for Amar's petition]Click Here To Read/Download Order

Supreme Court Reserves Judgment On PIL To Make e-KYC Process Accessible For Acid Attack Survivors & Persons With Blindness/Low Vision

Gursimran Kaur Bakshi

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