UPI 'KYC Update' Fraud: Pleadings Set, Trial-Observation Report & Seminar on Electronic Evidence

This bundle is a clinical drafting pack built around one fictional but very ordinary cyber-crime file. A retired schoolteacher in a Karnataka town receives a text asking her to 'update KYC' to avoid her bank account being frozen. She follows the link, shares an OTP and loses ₹1.8 lakh in six UPI transfers that pass through three 'money-mule' accounts. One mule account holder, a 20-year-old delivery worker who rented out his account for ₹5,000, is later arrested.

From that single file the pack drafts the documents a junior advocate actually prepares: a complaint to the cyber-crime police that becomes an FIR under section 173 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (BNSS); an application under BNSS section 175(3) to the Magistrate when the police sit on it; a regular bail application under BNSS section 480 for the mule account holder; a letter to the bank invoking the RBI's customer-liability circular; and a certificate under section 63 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 (BSA) for the screenshots and SMS records.

Alongside the drafts sit a trial-observation report from a magistrate's court hearing an IT Act matter, and a seminar paper tracing how the law on electronic evidence moved from section 65B of the old Evidence Act (Anvar P.V., Arjun Panditrao Khotkar) to section 63 BSA. Every section number is given with its old IPC/CrPC/IEA equivalent so the drafts make sense to examiners trained on either code.

Abstract

Digital-payment fraud is now the most common cyber-crime reported by ordinary Indians, yet final-year law students rarely draft the documents such a case needs. This project uses a fictional UPI 'KYC update' fraud to produce a complete pleadings set under the new criminal laws in force from 1 July 2024 — BNS, BNSS and BSA — read with the Information Technology Act, 2000. It adds a trial-observation report and a seminar paper on the admissibility of electronic records, the single issue that decides most cyber-fraud trials.

Introduction

A cyber-fraud victim needs three things quickly: an FIR, a freeze on the money trail and a refund from the bank. The accused — often a low-level mule account holder — needs bail and a defence on knowledge and intent. Both sides need electronic evidence that will survive a trial. The BCI clinical course on Drafting, Pleading and Conveyancing tests exactly these skills, but model drafts in most textbooks still cite the Indian Penal Code and the Code of Criminal Procedure.

Existing material and gap

• Standard drafting books provide generic complaint and bail formats, mostly under CrPC.
• Cyber-law textbooks explain IT Act offences but rarely show a complete file from complaint to bail.
• After 2024, students must learn new section numbers and the new BSA certificate format, and the transition is where most drafting errors now occur.
• Gap: a single, consistent case file that shows each pleading under the new codes with old-code equivalents and the evidentiary foundation each document needs.

Proposed work

1. Draft the fact file, timeline and transaction trail.
2. Draft five pleadings/instruments for complainant and accused.
3. Observe at least two hearings in an IT Act or cheating matter and write a structured report.
4. Write a seminar paper on electronic-evidence admissibility from Anvar P.V. to section 63 BSA.

Feasibility

All statutes are on India Code; judgments are on SCC Online or Manupatra through the college library. Court observation needs only a letter from the principal. The work is individual and fits a 10-week clinical calendar. All names are fictional and no real case papers are copied.

Victims of UPI and OTP fraud often lose days between the fraud and the FIR because their complaint is vague, names the wrong offences or is sent to the wrong authority, and in that time the money leaves the mule accounts. On the other side, young mule account holders are arrested for offences carrying up to seven years, and poorly drafted bail applications fail to address the tests the court actually applies. At trial, prosecutions collapse when screenshots, call records and bank statements are produced without the certificate the evidence law requires.

This project asks how a complete and correct set of pleadings should be drafted for such a case under BNS, BNSS, BSA and the IT Act, 2000, and what the transition from section 65B of the Indian Evidence Act to section 63 of the BSA means for proving electronic records. The aim is a file that a junior advocate could use as a working model and that a clinical examiner can test line by line.

In scope

• Offences: IT Act ss. 66C (identity theft) and 66D (cheating by personation using a computer resource); BNS s.318 (cheating) and s.319 (cheating by personation).
• Procedure: BNSS s.173 (FIR, including e-FIR and registration irrespective of territorial jurisdiction), s.175(3) (Magistrate-directed investigation), s.35 (arrest and notice of appearance), s.480 (bail in non-bailable offences).
• Evidence: BSA s.63 certificate for electronic records.
• Banking: RBI circular on limiting customer liability in unauthorised electronic transactions (6 July 2017).
• Conveyancing link: a special power of attorney authorising a family member to follow up with the bank.

Out of scope

• Civil recovery suits and adjudication under IT Act s.46 (noted only as an alternative remedy).
• Full conveyancing set (sale deed, lease, will) — these come from the class exercise book.
• Any real person, real case number or real court record.

The project combines a doctrinal method (statutes and case law) with an empirical observation method (structured court diary).

Research questions

1. Which offences and procedural provisions correctly describe a UPI personation fraud under the new codes?
2. What must a bail application for a mule account holder address to succeed?
3. What foundation must be laid for electronic records under s.63 BSA, and how does it differ from s.65B IEA?

Sources — bare acts from India Code; Supreme Court decisions (Lalita Kumari v. Govt. of U.P. (2014) 2 SCC 1 on mandatory FIR registration; Arnesh Kumar v. State of Bihar (2014) 8 SCC 273 on arrest; Anvar P.V. v. P.K. Basheer (2014) 10 SCC 473 and Arjun Panditrao Khotkar v. Kailash Kushanrao Gorantyal (2020) 7 SCC 1 on electronic evidence; Shreya Singhal v. Union of India (2015) 5 SCC 1 on s.66A); standard drafting texts.

Timeline (10 weeks)

Citation and integrity — ILI footnoting style throughout. The seminar paper and report are checked on Turnitin or DrillBit, targeting the ≤ 10% no-penalty band of the UGC 2018 ladder as good practice.