India Data Removal Guide (2026)
Indian citizens are empowered under the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 (DPDP Act) to manage, correct, and erase their personal data from digital platforms, contact scrapers, and corporate data fiduciaries.
Research status: published guide pending fresh official-source re-verification.
This page is educational orientation, not legal advice. The legal fields below are a research snapshot; eligibility, exemptions, deadlines, penalty rules and broker routes can change. Verify the current statute and regulator guidance before relying on a right or filing a complaint.
At a glance
- Governing law
- DPDP Act
- Response deadline
- Prescribed under rules (standard 30 days via Grievance Redressal)
- Regulator
- Data Protection Board of India (DPBI) / Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY)
- Private right of action
- No: enforcement is handled via the Data Protection Board of India
Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 (DPDP Act)
Passed by Parliament in August 2023, the DPDP Act sets a comprehensive national framework for digital personal data in India. Data Principals have statutory rights to access, correction, erasure, nomination, and grievance redressal, enforced by the Data Protection Board of India with penalties up to ₹250 crore.
Read the full DPDP Actexplainer →Scope, penalties, private right of action, enforcement history.
What rights do India residents have?
- →Right to access summary of personal data and processing activities (Section 11(1))
- →Right to know identities of all other Data Fiduciaries and Processors with whom data was shared (Section 11(2))
- →Right to correction of inaccurate or misleading personal data (Section 12(1)(a))
- →Right to erasure of personal data that is no longer necessary for the specified purpose (Section 12(1)(c))
- →Right of grievance redressal with the Data Fiduciary (Section 13)
- →Right to nominate an individual to exercise rights in the event of death or incapacity (Section 14)
- →Right to withdraw consent at any time (Section 6(4))
Who holds your data in India?
In India, personal information is widespread across caller identification networks (Truecaller), public company director databases (Ministry of Corporate Affairs / MCA21 filings, Zauba Corp, Tofler), land records (State Bhulekh portals), and voter list aggregators. Digital marketing agencies and B2B lead platforms actively scrape and sell mobile numbers and professional emails.
Public-record sources brokers scrape
- Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA21) director identification and company filings
- Crowdsourced and scraped contact networks (Truecaller, caller ID databases)
- State government public land registration and electoral roll disclosures
- Telecom and fintech loan marketing lead databases
How to remove your data in India
- 1Delist and unlist your phone number from public caller ID databases (e.g. Truecaller Unlist tool).
- 2Submit Section 12 erasure requests to commercial corporate-intelligence websites indexing personal director addresses.
- 3Send withdrawal of consent and deletion notices to digital marketing lead brokers and credit aggregators.
- 4Escalate unresolved privacy violations to the company's Data Protection Officer or Grievance Officer, followed by the Data Protection Board of India.
Ready to remove
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Much of India residents' data is held by US-based people-search brokers. OfflistMe drafts a legally structured deletion email for each one, sent from your own inbox, no account, no ID upload. Pair it with the India-specific steps above.
Request Removal NowWhat if a company ignores your request?
File a complaint with the Data Protection Board of India (DPBI) / Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY). The maximum penalty in India is Up to ₹250 crore (approx. USD $30M) per contravention, and you may have a private right of action (No: enforcement is handled via the Data Protection Board of India).
File a complaint with the Data Protection Board of India (DPBI) / Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) ↗FAQ: India data removal
Can I remove my personal phone number and address from Indian websites under the DPDP Act?+
Yes. Under Section 12 of the DPDP Act 2023, an individual (Data Principal) has the right to demand the erasure of their personal data when it is no longer necessary for the purpose for which it was collected, or upon withdrawing consent.
What is the penalty for data brokers violating privacy rights in India?+
The Schedule to the DPDP Act 2023 empowers the Data Protection Board of India to impose financial penalties of up to ₹250 crore (approximately USD $30 million) for significant security failures, and up to ₹200 crore for failure to report breaches or handle user grievances.