Summary
- Introduced by Smt. Bharti Pardhi, M.P., as a private member's bill (not a Government bill). Lok Sabha record: introduced 5 Dec 2025, status Pending, ministry tagged Electronics and Information Technology.
- Would create an Ethics Committee for AI, appointed by the Central Government, with a chair skilled in ethics and technology plus members from academia, industry, civil society, government, law, data science and human rights (s.3).
- Committee would write ethical guidelines, monitor compliance, review misuse and bias cases, and handle complaints from affected people (ss.4, 7).
- AI surveillance limited to lawful purposes with the Committee's prior approval; AI in law enforcement, credit and employment must not discriminate on race, religion or gender and faces stringent ethical review (s.5).
- Developer duties (s.6): disclose purpose, limits, training data sources and methods and the reasons for decisions affecting individuals; run regular bias audits; use diverse datasets; withdraw significantly biased systems until fixed; keep compliance records.
- Penalties (s.8): fines up to Rs 5 crore, licence suspension or revocation, and criminal liability for repeat offences. The financial memorandum estimates Rs 500 crore a year recurring plus about Rs 100 crore one-time.
Who it applies to
- If enacted: all of India (s.1(2)). Duties fall on developers (people who design, develop and implement AI); "stakeholders" includes deployers, users and affected people.
- Surveillance and critical decision rules would reach deployers such as police, lenders and employers.
- Silent on companies outside India; not extraterritorial on its face.
- Today: applies to no one.
Key dates
- Date on the Statement of Objects and Reasons signed by the member
- Introduced in Lok Sabha as Bill No. 59 of 2025 (sansad.in record)
Full date record
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 20 Jan 2025 | Date on the member's Statement of Objects and Reasons |
| 5 Dec 2025 | Introduced in Lok Sabha (official sansad.in record) |
| As of 19 Oct 2026 | Status "Pending"; no committee referral, passage or assent recorded |
Penalties and enforcement
- None in force. Proposed penalties only (see Plain Summary).
- Key details (how licences work, how criminal liability is set) are left to future rules, which the bill does not define.
- Some secondary sources give 17 or 18 Dec 2025 as the introduction date; the official Lok Sabha record says 5 Dec 2025.
What it means for an Indian company
- No action required. It is a pending private member's bill.
- Worth tracking in a regulatory horizon register: SC-AI-009 Regulatory applicability register and horizon scanning.
- Its ideas overlap with good practice you may already need for other regimes: model disclosures (SC-AI-014 Model documentation (model cards, system cards), SC-AI-024 Explain AI-assisted decisions), bias audits (SC-AI-013 Data bias and representativeness checks, SC-AI-017 Fairness and discrimination testing of outputs, SC-AI-038 Independent bias audit), withdraw-and-fix (SC-AI-019 Change management and approval gates), records (SC-AI-032 Logging and record keeping) and complaints (SC-AI-028 Customer grievance redressal for AI).
- The Government's own direction prefers existing laws plus guidelines over a new AI Act; see India AI Governance Guidelines.
Obligations
Full obligation breakdown coming
We break the most requested policies down into numbered obligations mapped to controls. Leave your details and we’ll tell you when AI (Ethics and Accountability) Bill 2025 is done.
Glossary
- Private member's bill: a bill introduced by an MP who is not a minister.
- Lok Sabha: the lower house of India's Parliament.
- Statement of Objects and Reasons: the part of a bill explaining why it is proposed.
- Financial memorandum: the part of a bill estimating what it would cost the Government.
- Algorithmic bias: defined in the bill as systematic errors in AI that produce unfair outcomes.
- Developer: in the bill, a person who designs, develops and implements AI models and systems.
Key takeaways
- Proposed only. A pending private member's bill with almost no chance of passing as drafted.
- Would create a national AI Ethics Committee, developer transparency and bias audit duties, surveillance approvals, and fines up to Rs 5 crore.
- Useful as a horizon-scanning signal; no compliance work needed now.
Official sources
- Bill No. 59 of 2025, as introduced in Lok Sabha (sansad.in PDF), accessed 2026-10-19
- sansad.in bills record (API query showing introduction date 2025-12-05, member, status Pending), accessed 2026-10-19
- Secondary: MediaNama, Dec 2025 (its hosted bill copy matches the official text)
This is general information, not legal advice. Last verified 19 Oct 2026 against the official source. Laws change; confirm the current position with qualified counsel before acting.