One of my clients recently had a case which I am explaining below and if you are stuck in such similar situation, here is what to do.
Note: Due to attorney-client privilege, I cannot disclose complete case details or identify the actual parties involved. However, I am sharing the essential facts and legal approach so that if you find yourself in a similar situation, you can understand the available solutions and legal remedies.
TL;DR: If someone used your Aadhaar to take a loan, you are not the borrower unless you applied, signed or received the money. A reference name on a loan file is not a guarantee. Complain in writing to the lender's nodal officer, file a police or cybercrime complaint for identity theft, dispute any entry on your CIBIL report, and do not pay a rupee to a recovery agent.
The call came from a number nobody in the family recognised.
The man on the line asked for Amit Deshmukh. Nikhil Kulkarni said he had the wrong person, he was only the tenant. Then the call turned odd. The caller read out his father Mahesh Kulkarni's full name, the last four digits of his Aadhaar, and three phone numbers belonging to the family. A loan of roughly ₹4 lakh had been taken a year ago by Amit Deshmukh, he said, with Mahesh Kulkarni's Aadhaar listed as a reference. Clear the dues, or a legal notice would follow, against the Aadhaar card itself. Nikhil recorded the call. He never got the lender's name.
That Aadhaar had reached the landlord, Suresh Deshmukh, during a rental agreement renewal in Pune a year earlier. It was handed over for verification. The landlord's son used it. The EMIs stopped, and the son disappeared. Suresh Deshmukh's answer was a shrug and one line: talk to my son whenever he comes back.
A complaint at the bank branch went nowhere. The family then approached the Chamber of Advocate Sudhir Rao. The Chamber sent a written denial of liability to the lender's nodal officer, filed a cybercrime complaint against the landlord's son, and raised a dispute with the credit bureau. The calls stopped. Advocate Sudhir Rao's experience with identity-theft and loan-fraud matters was what moved a file that had been sitting still, and the client's father was kept out of the loan altogether.
Key Facts of the Case
- Mahesh Kulkarni's Aadhaar and phone number were shared with the landlord only for rental verification, during an agreement renewal.
- A loan of about ₹4 lakh was taken in the landlord's son's name. The father's Aadhaar was listed as a reference, nothing more.
- The father never applied, never signed, never completed a KYC in person, and never received a rupee.
- No EMI was paid for a year. The borrower is untraceable.
- The landlord disclaimed all responsibility and refused to cooperate.
- A recovery agent read out personal data over the phone and threatened a legal notice against the father's Aadhaar.
- The call was recorded by the family; the lender's identity was never disclosed.
- Legal position: a reference is not a borrower, and liability on a loan needs a contract.
The Direct Legal Answer
Should I call the recovery agent back and demand the bank name and loan account number?
No. Don't chase him. Calling back confirms the number is live and marks your family as people who engage. Wait for the next call, record it, and ask for the lender's registered name, the loan account number and the branch in one calm sentence. If he refuses to give it, that refusal is itself useful. Note the date, the time and the number.
Can the lender send my father a notice or damage his CIBIL score when he signed nothing?
A lender can post a notice to anyone. Whether it means anything is a different question. Liability needs a contract: an application, a signature or e-mandate, a KYC the person actually did, and disbursal to that person. A reference creates no obligation. If the loan appears on his CIBIL report, he can dispute the entry with the credit bureau and the lender, and demand its removal.
Should I file an FIR against the landlord's son, or serve the landlord a notice first?
File the police complaint first. A notice asks nicely. A complaint creates a record that the identity was used without consent, and that record is what a lender's fraud team actually acts on. The landlord can be named separately if he failed to safeguard documents entrusted to him. Both can run side by side.
Advice in Such Cases
Consult with Lawyer: The very basic and important step to start is talk to Lawyer / advocate. You should not hesitate in paying his consultation fee i.e. might be in range of Rs. 10,000 to 50,000 depends case to case. He is helping you in this situation to come out. He is expert in the domain and can help you explain the procedure which you might have never explored. A good lawyer can get the issues resolved much faster than you think.
Send a written denial of liability to the lender the moment you learn its name. Keep it short and factual: your father never applied for this loan, never signed any document, never received any money. Email it, so you have a timestamp.
Do not pay a single instalment to stop the calls. A part payment can be treated as acknowledgement of the debt later.
This kind of matter turns on procedural and
This kind of matter turns on documentary proof: what the lender actually holds on its file, whose bank account received the money, and whether the person named ever appeared for a KYC at all. The phone call proves nothing. The file proves everything. So the first job is to force the lender to show you the file.
What if someone used your Aadhaar to take a loan without your knowledge?
Then you are a victim of identity theft and a data subject. You are not a borrower. Nothing else on that loan file follows from your name being written on it. Keep that sentence in your head, because the whole fight is about whether the lender and the credit bureau accept it.
Everything below is Indian law, and it applies whether the lender is a bank, an NBFC or a fintech app working with one.
Step one: a written denial to the lender's nodal officer
Find the nodal officer's email on the lender's website. Do not send this to a branch manager or the recovery agent. Write four lines and no more. Your father never applied for this loan, never signed any document, never completed a KYC for it, and never received any money. Then ask for four things in writing: a copy of the loan application, the KYC record relied on, the proof of disbursal showing which bank account was credited, and how his name appears on the file — co-borrower, guarantor or reference.
Watch your own wording. Never write "please adjust", "I will look into it" or anything that resembles an offer. A denial letter must deny.
Step two: a police complaint, early
File on the cybercrime portal or at the nearest police station. A zero FIR can be registered at any station regardless of where the fraud happened. The offences in play are identity theft and cheating by personation using a computer resource under the Information Technology Act, 2006, along with cheating by personation under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023. If the station refuses to register it, a magistrate can be asked to direct an investigation.
Complain about the recovery agent separately. Call recordings are the cleanest document you will have, so keep the file, the number and the timing intact.
Step three: dispute the credit entry
Pull the credit report. Under the Credit Information Companies (Regulation) Act, 2005, a bureau has to look into a dispute and the lender has to confirm or correct what it reported. Raise it online, keep the acknowledgement number, and take a screenshot of the entry as it stands today. If the entry survives the dispute, that refusal becomes evidence in your favour later.
Step four: what not to do
- Do not pay a single instalment, not even to stop the calls. A part payment can later be argued as acknowledgement of the debt.
- Do not sign a settlement letter, an acknowledgement or a "confirmation of liability" that someone brings to your door.
- Do not complete a fresh e-KYC "to clear the matter". That creates a new consent record in your name.
- Do not share OTPs, and do not hand over original documents to anyone collecting on the file.
Step five: escalate if the lender stays silent
The RBI's Integrated Ombudsman Scheme, 2021 covers complaints against banks and NBFCs, and the RBI's digital lending directions require a grievance officer with a defined turnaround time. Recovery conduct is covered by those directions as well. If the lender proposes to tag the account as a fraud account, the directions require a show-cause notice and a chance to be heard before the tag goes on. Ask for that opportunity in writing.
Reference, guarantor, co-borrower — the difference decides everything
- Co-borrower: signed the loan, liable jointly and severally.
- Guarantor: signed a guarantee. Liability does not begin until the lender pursues the borrower, and there are conditions attached.
- Reference: supplied a name and a phone number. No signature, no contract, no liability.
Get the lender to say in writing which of the three they claim. A recovery agent's word on a phone call is worth nothing. If the file does carry a signature that is claimed to be your father's, get that sorted immediately — a disputed signature can be examined and compared by a handwriting expert during proceedings, and asking for that early changes the tone of the whole matter.
How long does this take
The demand calls usually thin out within a few weeks of a written denial and a police complaint going on record, in the matters I have handled. That is an observation, not an assurance about your case. Clearing a wrong entry from a credit report tends to take longer. If the lender chooses to sue, the matter can run for years.
Limitation, and the honest limits of this defence
A money claim under a written contract is governed by a three-year limitation period under the Limitation Act, though when that clock starts depends on the facts. Do not read silence as closure. Keep the denial letter and the complaint copy permanently, and keep them safe in more than one place.
And some honest limits. If a signature on the file is genuinely your relative's, or the money landed in an account anyone in the family controlled, the denial gets harder and the case changes shape. Tell your lawyer that on day one rather than letting the other side discover it in year two. On those facts there may be nothing to argue on liability, and the work shifts to who actually benefited and who is liable for the loss.
Frequently Asked Questions
Will a reference name on a loan make my father liable to pay?
No. Liability on a loan needs a contract — an application, a signature or e-mandate, a KYC done by the person, and disbursal to that person or on their instruction. A reference does none of that.
Can the lender freeze his bank account or attach his salary?
Not on its own. Attaching salary or a bank balance needs a decree or an order from a court or tribunal, or a lawful set-off against the bank's own dues from that customer. A stranger's loan is not the bank's own dues.
A legal notice has already arrived. What now?
Reply in writing through a lawyer within the time given in the notice. Ignoring it helps nobody and lets the lender's version sit on record unanswered. The reply also forces them to produce the documents behind the claim.
Should we pay something to protect his CIBIL score?
No. Payment neither removes a wrong entry nor guarantees anything, and it may create an admission. Dispute the entry and let the lender justify it.
Where do we complain about the recovery agent's threats?
Three places, in this order: the lender's nodal officer, then the RBI Ombudsman, and the police if there is a threat or a demand that amounts to extortion. The recording is the document that matters most here.
Can a photocopy of Aadhaar left with a landlord be used to take a loan?
It should not be, and that is the lender's problem, not your father's. A photocopy is not authentication, and proper KYC requires the person to be present or verified through a process he consented to. A lender that disbursed without that has its own explaining to do, and that gap is usually the strongest point in the file.
What to send us before you call
Keep it short. The denial letter if you have already sent one, the police or cybercrime acknowledgement, a PDF or screenshot of the credit report entry, and a two-line note giving the dates of the calls and the number that called. Include the loan account number if the agent let it slip. If you have none of these yet, send the two-line note anyway — that is enough to start.
Write in through /contact-us or fix a time at /book. Chamber: Chamber No. 86, Supreme Court of India, New Delhi 110001. Phone +91 97295 06771. Email me@sudhirrao.com. Family and matrimonial matters are handled by Adv. Jyoti Rao.
This article is general information about Indian law and is not legal advice on your own situation. Please consult an advocate before acting on it.
Advocate Sudhir Rao, Supreme Court of India
Facing a similar matter? Speak to a Delhi criminal defence lawyer — Advocate Sudhir Rao appears in bail, trial and appellate matters before the Delhi District Courts, the Delhi High Court and the Supreme Court of India.