The section that replaced Section 65B of the Evidence Act on 1 July 2024 — and the certificate is not what it used to be. A prescribed format in a Schedule, a second signature from an expert, and the hash value of the file. What that means for your WhatsApp chats, your CCTV and your bank records, and the one situation where you need no certificate at all.
Section 63 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 decides when an electronic record can be used as evidence. It replaced Section 65B of the Indian Evidence Act on 1 July 2024. WhatsApp chats, emails, call recordings, CCTV footage, UPI and bank records all live here.
The certificate changed, and most pages have not caught up. It must now be in the format prescribed by the Schedule to the Act; it must be signed by two people — the person in charge of the device and an expert; and the format calls for the hash value of the record, with SHA-1, SHA-256 and MD5 among the options. Under Section 65B one signature and no prescribed form were enough.
You do not always need a certificate. It is required only for secondary evidence — a printout, an export, a copy on a pen drive. If the original device is produced and its owner steps into the witness box, no certificate is needed. This is the point almost everybody gets wrong.
Do not confuse the two section 63s. Old Evidence Act Section 63 was secondary evidence; that is now Section 58 BSA. New Section 63 BSA is electronic records.
Before anything else, a numbering trap that catches practitioners as well as clients.
| What you are looking for | Old law (till 30 June 2024) | New law (from 1 July 2024) |
|---|---|---|
| Electronic records — admissibility and certificate | Section 65B, Indian Evidence Act | Section 63 BSA |
| Secondary evidence — what it is | Section 63, Indian Evidence Act | Section 58 BSA |
| Primary evidence | Section 62, Indian Evidence Act | Section 57 BSA |
| Electronic records — general provision | Section 65A | Section 62 BSA |
| Opinion of experts | Section 45 | Section 39 BSA |
| Communications during marriage | Section 122 | Section 128 BSA |
The scheme is straightforward once the language is stripped away. An electronic record produced by a computer or a communication device — a printout, a copy, an export — is treated as a document and is admissible without further proof of the original, provided two things are satisfied.
First, four conditions about how the record came into existence:
Second, a certificate identifying the record, describing how it was produced, and giving particulars of the device — and, under the new law, doing so in a prescribed form with two signatures.
| Point | Section 65B, Evidence Act | Section 63, BSA |
|---|---|---|
| What is covered | Computers | Computers and communication devices, semi-conductor memory, and records otherwise stored, recorded or copied in electronic form |
| Systems and networks | Not expressly | Expressly covers computer systems, computer networks and intermediaries — which brings in cloud and platform data |
| Who signs the certificate | One person — someone occupying a responsible official position | Two — the person in charge of the device or the relevant activities, and an expert |
| Form of the certificate | No prescribed form | A format prescribed in a Schedule to the Act, with Part A for the party and Part B for the expert |
| Hash value | Not mentioned | Called for in the format, with SHA-1, SHA-256 and MD5 among the listed algorithms |
| When it must be given | Not spelt out | Expressly, at each instance where the record is submitted for admission |
The first change removes an argument that used to be run: that a mobile phone was not a "computer". The words now put that beyond dispute.
The rest of the changes go one way — the certificate has become a more formal, more technical document. That is a burden, but it is also a protection: a properly hashed and certified record is much harder for the other side to attack later.
The Schedule sets out a form in two parts.
Part A is completed by the party producing the record. In substance it asks:
Part B mirrors this and is executed by the expert.
The second signature raised an obvious question, and the courts have given two different answers.
In October 2024 the Madras High Court read the requirement strictly, holding that Part B must be signed by an examiner notified under the Information Technology Act, and directing that such experts be notified in every district.
In May 2026 the Supreme Court took a wider view in a matter brought by a bar association challenging the provision. It upheld the requirement and the Schedule, describing the hash value of electronic data as being synonymous with an electronic fingerprint and Part B as providing an additional layer of authenticity. On who may sign, it reasoned that the expert-evidence provision is not prefaced by a non-obstante clause, so a person possessing special skill and expertise in computer science and cyber forensics may sign — and said the Madras High Court's restrictive view should not be treated as a binding precedent.
This section is the most valuable thing on this page, because the assumption that a certificate is always required has caused an enormous amount of unnecessary difficulty.
The certificate is a requirement for secondary evidence — for a printout, a copy, an export, a CD. Where the original electronic record is itself produced, it is primary evidence and the certificate provision does not apply.
The Supreme Court held that the certificate "is unnecessary if the original document itself is produced", and that this "can be done by the owner of a laptop computer, a computer tablet or even a mobile phone, by stepping into the witness box and proving that the concerned device ... is owned and/or operated by him."
The BSA has widened this further. The provision on primary evidence now carries Explanations to the effect that where an electronic record is stored in several files, each of those files is primary evidence; that a record from proper custody is primary evidence; that where a video is recorded simultaneously in several places, each recording is primary evidence; and that this extends to records stored automatically, including temporary files.
This area has been reversed more than once, which is why so much of what is written about it is out of date. The sequence matters.
| Decision | What it held | Status |
|---|---|---|
| State (NCT of Delhi) v. Navjot Sandhu (2005) | Electronic records could be proved as secondary evidence without a certificate | Overruled |
| Anvar P.V. v. P.K. Basheer (2014) | Overruled the above. Secondary electronic evidence is not admissible unless the certificate requirements are satisfied — but the certificate is not needed where the record is used as primary evidence | Good law |
| Shafhi Mohammad v. State of H.P. (2018) | Created an exception where the party did not control the device | Overruled — dead law |
| Arjun Panditrao Khotkar (2020), three judges | Overruled Shafhi Mohammad. The certificate is a mandatory pre-condition for secondary electronic evidence; oral evidence cannot take its place; but the court can direct its production at any stage while the trial is on, and can summon it from whoever holds it | The governing authority |
"Oral evidence in the place of such certificate cannot possibly suffice as Section 65B(4) is a mandatory requirement of the law."
And on timing: "So long as the hearing in a trial is not yet over, the requisite certificate can be directed to be produced by the learned Judge at any stage."
Often, yes — but treat that as a rescue, not a plan.
On the permissive side: Arjun Panditrao allows the judge to direct production of the certificate at any stage while the hearing is not over, and in 2023 the Supreme Court held that producing it later caused no irreversible prejudice to the accused and that non-production was a curable defect.
On the other side, two recent decisions show what happens when the point is left to chance. In 2024 the Delhi High Court declined to read WhatsApp conversations without a proper certificate. In 2025 the Supreme Court excluded CCTV footage in a capital case for want of one.
The lesson is not that courts are unforgiving. It is that the party who prepares the certificate at the outset never has to find out how forgiving a particular court will be.
| The evidence | Who signs Part A | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| WhatsApp chat on your own phone | You — you have lawful control | A High Court has held in 2026 that a party may self-certify chats from a device in their own control, provided the section's requirements are met |
| A call recording you made | You | Keep the original file and the phone, not just a forwarded copy |
| CCTV from your own premises | You, or the person in charge of the DVR | The Schedule's source list expressly includes a DVR |
| CCTV from someone else's premises | That owner | If refused, apply to have it summoned — and ask for the certificate with it |
| Bank statement, UPI or card records | The bank's officer | There is also a long-standing separate route for bankers' books, expressly preserved by the new procedure code |
| Email on your own or your company's server | You or your IT administrator | Export in a format that keeps the headers, not as a pasted screenshot |
| Email in a webmail account | You, as the person controlling the mailbox | Same point about headers |
| Records held by a telecom operator or a platform | Their nodal officer | You cannot obtain these yourself — the court must summon them |
Most of the digital evidence our readers have is on WhatsApp, and most of it is produced in the weakest possible form.
| Screenshot | Export |
|---|---|
| No metadata | Carries timestamps in a continuous file |
| Easily cropped — and the other side will say so | Shows the thread without gaps |
| Breaks the continuity of the conversation | Preserves sequence, which is often the whole point |
| Cannot meaningfully be hashed back to an original | A single file that can be hashed and certified |
Use the application's own export function, including media, produce the exported file, compute its hash, and keep the phone. A screenshot may still be used, but it invites an argument you did not need to have.
A question we are asked constantly: a spouse has recorded the other's calls without telling them. Can it be used?
In 2025 the Supreme Court answered it. A High Court had excluded such recordings as a breach of the right to privacy. The Supreme Court reversed. Its reasoning was that the provision protecting communications made during marriage exists to protect the sanctity of marriage rather than privacy as such, and that the exception built into that provision covers proceedings between the spouses themselves.
"When the right to privacy of communication between spouses is the very basis of Section 122 then the exceptions to these should also flow only from Section 122."
Two qualifications matter. Evidence is not automatically inadmissible merely because of how it was obtained — but the recording still has to be relevant, the voices have to be identified, and it has to be shown to be free from tampering. That last point is precisely what the hash value and the certificate exist to establish. A recording that has been trimmed, merged or re-recorded from a speakerphone is asking to be attacked.
CCTV has one characteristic that makes it different from everything else: it disappears by itself. Systems overwrite on a cycle, and by the time a case is filed the footage is very often gone.
These are usually the backbone of a cheating or breach of trust case, and they are the easiest to get right.
The mistake with email is producing a forwarded copy or a pasted screenshot. What matters is the headers — the routing information that shows where the message actually came from. Export the message in a format that retains them, and have the person who administers the mailbox or the server complete Part A.
Call detail records, platform data, a bank's records of an account that is not yours, a company's internal logs — none of these can be obtained by you directly, and asking politely rarely works.
The route is an application to the court. In a criminal matter, the procedure code allows a court or an officer in charge of a police station to order the production of documents, electronic communications and devices containing digital evidence. In a civil or matrimonial matter, the equivalent is an application for summons to produce documents.
This page explains the law in general terms. It cannot tell you what to do about your own facts — only an advocate who has read your papers can do that. You can look through the advocates associated with Legal Space Services who practise in criminal and matrimonial matters, see their enrolment details and areas of practice, and send a consultation request. Searching and sending a request are free.
The BSA carries forward a set of presumptions about electronic records: about electronic agreements, about electronic records and signatures, about Electronic Signature Certificates, about electronic messages, and about electronic records five years old.
They are useful, but they are not a substitute for the certificate, for two reasons. They are "may presume" provisions — the court may draw the presumption, not must. And the one dealing with electronic messages does not presume who sent the message, which is very often the fact actually in dispute.
| The case | The evidence | What usually goes wrong |
|---|---|---|
| Cruelty under Section 85, maintenance, divorce | WhatsApp messages, call recordings, photographs | Screenshots only; the phone replaced during the case; no certificate until the trial is nearly over |
| Cheating under Section 318 | The representation in writing, the payment trail, chats | Bank records taken as app screenshots; chats forwarded rather than exported |
| Breach of trust under Section 316 | Accounts, delivery records, correspondence | Records summoned without the certificate |
| Any case turning on where somebody was | CCTV, call detail records | Footage overwritten before anyone asked for it |
The pattern in all of these is the same, and it is worth stating plainly: the evidence is usually lost in the first week, not in the courtroom. By the time the objection is taken, the phone has been replaced and the footage has been overwritten, and no amount of argument recovers it.
Abstractions are hard to act on, so here is what a properly prepared bundle actually looks like. Assume you have a chat with the other side that matters to your case.
| Step | What you do | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Stop using the phone for anything that would alter the chat. Do not delete, do not clear media, do not update anything you do not have to | Every change is a change the other side can point at |
| 2 | Note the phone's make, model, colour, serial number and IMEI, and the number the account is registered to | Part A of the certificate asks for exactly these |
| 3 | Use the application's export function on that chat, including media, and save it to a computer | An export is one continuous file; screenshots are fragments |
| 4 | Compute the hash of the exported file — SHA-256 is the sensible default — and write it down with the date and the time in IST | This is the fingerprint that proves the file in court is the file taken from the phone |
| 5 | Copy the file to a clean pen drive or disc; do not edit it, rename the copy rather than the original if you must | Editing changes the hash and undoes step 4 |
| 6 | Keep the phone. Switched on if you still use it, switched off and put away if you have moved to a new one | The original device is primary evidence and needs no certificate |
| 7 | Have Part A completed and Part B signed before the record is filed | The section requires the certificate at each instance the record is submitted for admission |
| 8 | Give your advocate the exported file itself — on the drive — not a forward | Forwarding through a messaging application re-compresses the media and changes the hash |
Knowing the objections in advance is how you prepare against them. These are the ones that actually get made.
| The objection | How it is answered |
|---|---|
| "There is no certificate." | File it. If the trial is still on, the court can direct its production. Better: file it with the record |
| "The certificate is signed by only one person." | The BSA requires two — Part A and Part B. Get the expert signature; do not argue about it |
| "The certificate is not in the prescribed form." | Use the Schedule's format. A lawyer-drafted paragraph in the old style is exactly what this objection is aimed at |
| "These are cropped screenshots." | Produce the export instead, and the device. This is why step 3 above matters |
| "The file could have been edited." | The hash, recorded at the time of export, is the answer — and it only works if it was recorded then |
| "You cannot show this came from that phone." | Device particulars in Part A, plus the original device if it can be produced |
| "The recording is edited or joined." | Produce the original file, not a re-recording; the hash and the device particulars again |
| "Whose voice is this?" | Voice identification is a separate requirement and has to be led as evidence. Plan for it |
| "The DVR clock was wrong." | Note the system time against the actual time when you take the footage, and say so |
| "The bank sent the statement but no certificate." | Ask for both in the summons. Fixing it after the witness is discharged is difficult |
Notice that almost every answer is something done before the case reached court. That is the whole point of this page.
It governs when an electronic record — a WhatsApp chat, an email, a call recording, CCTV footage, a bank statement — can be admitted in evidence as a document, and what certificate has to accompany it. It replaced Section 65B of the Indian Evidence Act on 1 July 2024.
That was Section 63 of the old Evidence Act. Under the new law, secondary evidence is Section 58 of the BSA, and Section 63 BSA is electronic records — the old 65B. Two very different things now share the number 63, so check which Act a page is talking about before you rely on it.
The four conditions and the three things the certificate must state are carried over. But the certificate itself changed materially: it must now be in a prescribed format set out in a Schedule to the Act, it must be signed by two people — the person in charge of the device and an expert — and the format calls for the hash value of the record. None of that existed under Section 65B.
Only when you are producing secondary evidence — a printout, a copy, a CD, a pen drive, an export. If the original is produced — you bring the phone or the laptop itself and go into the witness box to prove it is yours — no certificate is required. This is the single most misunderstood point in the whole subject.
Two people. The person in charge of the computer or communication device, or of the management of the relevant activities — that is usually you, for your own phone — and an expert. The format has a Part A for the first and a Part B for the expert.
This was contested. The Madras High Court in 2024 read it as requiring an examiner notified under the Information Technology Act. In May 2026 the Supreme Court took a wider view, holding that the expert provision is not prefaced by a non-obstante clause and that a person with special skill and expertise in computer science and cyber forensics may sign — and said the Madras High Court view is not to be treated as a binding precedent. Ask your advocate who the courts in your district are currently accepting.
It is a fixed-length string computed from the file. Change one pixel or one character and the string changes completely, so it shows that the copy in court is the same file that was taken from the device. The Supreme Court described it in 2026 as being synonymous with an electronic fingerprint. The format lists SHA-1, SHA-256 and MD5 as options.
Usually yes. The Supreme Court held in 2020 that so long as the hearing in the trial is not over, the judge can direct the certificate to be produced at any stage, and in 2023 that late production causes no irreversible prejudice to the accused. But do not plan around that. A Delhi High Court decision in 2024 refused to read WhatsApp conversations without a proper certificate, and in 2025 the Supreme Court excluded CCTV footage in a capital case for want of one.
No. The BSA carries forward presumptions about electronic agreements, electronic records and signatures, electronic messages and five-year-old electronic records — but they are all "may presume" provisions, and the one about messages does not presume who sent it. None of them substitutes for the certificate.
Yes, if produced properly. A printout or an export is secondary evidence and needs the certificate; the phone itself is primary evidence and does not. The Andhra Pradesh High Court held in 2026 that a party can self-certify chats from a device in their own lawful control, provided the requirements of the section are met.
They are the weakest form you can bring. A screenshot carries no metadata, can be cropped, breaks the continuity of the thread, and cannot be hashed back to an original. Use WhatsApp's own export function, including media, and keep the phone.
The Supreme Court held in 2025 that such a recording is not barred in a proceeding between the spouses. The provision protecting communications between spouses exists to protect the sanctity of marriage, not privacy as such, and its exception covers proceedings between them. That said, the recording still has to be relevant, the voices have to be identified, and it must be shown to be untampered — which is exactly what the hash and the certificate are for.
Ask immediately in writing, because most systems overwrite within days or weeks. If it is refused, apply to the court to summon it — and ask for the footage and the certificate together, because footage arriving without one creates the same problem in a different place.
The bank's officer signs. There is also a separate route for bankers' books that has existed since 1891 and is expressly preserved. Get bank-issued statements rather than screenshots of the app.
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