Section 335 of the New IPC covers “Making of false document” and includes “Electronic Document. Currently, the section 4 of ITA 2000 was already extending any laws which applied to a paper document to the electronic document and there was no need for the NIPC to re-iterate this in multiple sections. At best one reference under the definition clause referring to Section 4 of ITA 2000 and stating that whatever provisions applied to paper documents also applied to electronic documents except where specifically excluded. However without understanding the benefit of the bridging clause in Section 4 of ITA 2000, New IPC states time and again applicability of a section to electronic documents.
One such reference is found in Section 335, Explanation 3 which states
For the purposes of this section, the expression “affixing electronic signature” shall have the meaning assigned to it in clause (d) of sub-section (1) of section 2 of the Information Technology Act, 2000.
This explanation restricts the meaning of “Electronic Forgery” and limits it to digital/electronic signatures under Section 3/3A of ITA 2000.
We may recall the case of The Government of Tamil Nadu Vs Suhas Katti which was historically the first case of conviction under ITA 2000 where “Writing the name of a different person below the message text was considered as Forgery”. This would now be available under Section 336 under the new IPC.
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Naavi
