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Over Rs3.5 Lakh Crore in Unclaimed Financial Assets: Supreme Court Issues Notice on PIL
Moneylife Digital Team 10 October 2025
Investor Interest
The Supreme Court has issued notice in a public interest litigation (PIL) seeking the creation of a comprehensive legal and institutional framework to track and return over Rs3.5 lakh crore in unclaimed financial assets to their rightful owners. The matter was heard by a bench of justice Vikram Nath and justice Sandeep Mehta which directed the Union government and financial regulators to respond.
 
The PIL is filed by Aakash Goel, a Delhi-based activist, engineer, and entrepreneur who has been raising concerns about the rapid accumulation of unclaimed funds across the financial system. According to his plea, these assets include dormant or inoperative bank accounts, unclaimed dividends, unpaid provident fund balances, matured but unpaid insurance proceeds, unredeemed mutual fund units and post-office deposits. 
 
They are scattered across institutions overseen by regulators such as Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI), Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) and Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA). Despite the existence of funds such as the depositor education and awareness fund (DEAF) of RBI, the investor education and protection fund (IEPF) and the senior citizens’ welfare fund (SCWF), the overall amount of unclaimed money has ballooned from about Rs13,000 crore in 2016 to more than Rs3.5 lakh crore in 2024–25.
 
Mr Goel argues that the absence of a centralised, KYC-linked mechanism to help citizens or their heirs consolidate and claim financial assets violates several fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution. These include the right to equality under Article 14, the right to information under Article 19(1)(a), the right to life and dignity under Article 21, and the right to property under Article 300A. The petition emphasises that the burden of this systemic gap falls disproportionately on senior citizens, migrants, low-income households and others who lack the resources to navigate complex legal and bureaucratic procedures. He has pointed out that while banks and non-banking finance companies (NBFCs) aggressively pursue borrowers using centralised credit data such as TransUnion CIBIL, there is no equivalent mechanism to provide citizens with a consolidated picture of their own assets.
 
The issue is not entirely new. In December 2024, the Delhi High Court had disposed an earlier petition by Mr Goel with directions to the authorities to treat it as a representation. However, in responses to queries filed under the Right to Information (RTI) Act and legal notices, RBI and other regulators declined to take further steps beyond existing guidelines. 
 
While SEBI has introduced measures such as revamping nomination and transmission rules and RBI launched the UDGAM portal in 2023 to allow searches of unclaimed deposits, these efforts have been partial and limited in scope. For instance, UDGAM only covers deposits that have remained unclaimed for 10 years, excluding the much larger pool of inoperative accounts.
 
Moneylife’s Role
Moneylife Foundation has been pursuing this issue independently for many years. In 2022, its trustee Sucheta Dalal had filed a PIL in the Supreme Court demanding that regulators publish details of unclaimed financial assets on a centralised public platform. The apex court had issued notice in that matter as well (Read: SC Issues Notice on Plea By Sucheta Dalal That Information on Unclaimed Amounts Lying in Dormant Accounts Be Made Publicly Available). That case remains pending.
 
Moneylife has also consistently reported on the growing scale of the problem. In August 2024, we reported that over Rs2 lakh crore was lying in inoperative bank accounts on the verge of becoming unclaimed (Read: Forgotten Wealth of Ordinary Indians: Over Rs2 Lakh Crore Locked in Unclaimed Assets). Another investigation showed that banks had transferred Rs1.44 lakh crore to the RBI’s DEAF over five years, while only Rs5,729 crore had been refunded to claimants (Read: Banks Transferred Unclaimed Deposits Worth Rs1.44 Lakh Crore to DEA Fund in 5 Years). The Foundation has also produced a detailed note, outlining the need for a statutory body and unified database to manage unclaimed assets (Read: Note on Central Authority For Unclaimed Funds) and separately published a study examining the Challenges in Transmission of Assets to Nominees and Legal Heirs.
 
With the new notice in Mr Goel’s petition, the issue of unclaimed assets has once again, come under judicial scrutiny. The responses of the government and regulators will determine whether the Court restricts itself to incremental disclosures or pushes for a comprehensive statutory framework. Either way, the matter has brought fresh focus to a problem that has quietly grown into one of the largest pools of locked-up household savings in India. 
 
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Comments
vjanakiraman33
1 month ago
It is incorrect to call these UNCLAIMED'. In my case many a time have my claims have been rejected, on procedural matters. The worst offender is Karvy. The RTAs are only only worried about the companies, and give a short shrift to share holders. For years I send my request, but they find some excuse to keep back the money
Reply
r_ashok41
1 month ago
it is high time govt acts on the same and penalise the banks for not honouring people who have submitted the claims than delaying the same and strict action need to be taken against those banks
Reply
pst123
1 month ago
There are innumerable hurdles in submitting your claim with IEPF even with professional help.God willing if your claim is submitted successfully,there is no guarantee that you finally get your shares/Dividends back even after two years of submitting claims.By that time rightful owners may not be surviving.Authorities/Regulators are just not accountable.Where is investor protection. We are only flogging dead horses.The whole process of returning shares/Dividends can be as simple as once shares are dematerialised on the basis of entitlement letters,all shares/ Dividends can be released Intentionally process is designed to the disadvantage of investors/rightful owners so that vested interests could thrive at their cost.
Reply
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