What Can and Cannot Be E-Signed in India After the 2022 First Schedule Amendment
The 2022 amendment to the IT Act's First Schedule narrowed the list of documents that cannot be e-signed. Four years on, here is what it changed, what it did not, and a checklist of which property and lending documents can be executed end-to-end digitally.
Section 1(4) of the Information Technology Act, 2000 says the Act does not apply to the documents listed in its First Schedule. That short list is the only statutory limit on electronic execution in India, which is why the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology's notification of 26 September 2022 (S.O. 4720(E)) amending it mattered. Vendor blogs still describe the change as "latest"; it is four years old, and the useful question now is what it left in place. Position as of October 2026.
What the First Schedule looked like before
Five entries excluded from the IT Act, and therefore from electronic signature and electronic record provisions:
- A negotiable instrument (other than a cheque) under the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881.
- A power-of-attorney under the Powers-of-Attorney Act, 1882.
- A trust under the Indian Trusts Act, 1882.
- A will or other testamentary disposition under the Indian Succession Act, 1925.
- Any contract for the sale or conveyance of immovable property or any interest in such property.
What the 2022 amendment changed
- Entry 5 was deleted. Contracts for the sale or conveyance of immovable property are no longer excluded from the IT Act. An agreement to sell, a sale deed or a mortgage document can now be an electronic record and carry an electronic signature so far as the IT Act is concerned.
- Entry 1 was narrowed. Alongside cheques, a demand promissory note or a bill of exchange issued in favour of, or endorsed by, an entity regulated by the RBI, National Housing Bank, SEBI, IRDAI or PFRDA was carved out of the exclusion. A loan DPN in favour of a bank or NBFC can be executed electronically; a promissory note between two individuals cannot.
- Entry 2 was narrowed. A power-of-attorney that empowers one of those regulated entities to act for the executant was carved out. A general power of attorney between private parties stays excluded.
- Entries 3 and 4 were not touched. Trusts and wills remain outside the IT Act.
What the amendment did not change
This is the part most summaries skip.
Registration is a separate requirement. Deleting Entry 5 removed the IT Act bar; it did not touch the Registration Act, 1908. Section 17(1)(b) still requires registration of non-testamentary instruments that create, declare, assign, limit or extinguish rights in immovable property of Rs 100 or more, and section 17(1)(d) requires it for leases from year to year, for a term exceeding one year, or reserving a yearly rent. Section 107 of the Transfer of Property Act, 1882 says such leases "can be made only by a registered instrument". An e-signed sale deed that is not presented for registration has the same problem an unregistered paper deed has. Whether a sub-registrar will accept an electronically signed instrument for registration depends on the state's registration rules and systems, which vary. ****
Stamp duty applies regardless of format. The Indian Stamp Act, 1899 and state stamp laws charge duty on the instrument; section 17 requires stamping before or at execution and section 35 bars an unstamped instrument from evidence until duty and penalty are paid. Electronic execution does not remove the duty; e-stamping is how the two are combined.
Agreements to sell and section 53A. Under section 17(1A) of the Registration Act, an unregistered agreement to sell has "no effect" for the purpose of the part-performance protection in section 53A of the Transfer of Property Act, though the Supreme Court in Ameer Minhaj v. Dierdre Elizabeth (Wright) Issar (4 July 2018) confirmed it can still be received as evidence of the contract in a suit for specific performance. Electronic execution does not change that analysis.
Checklist: which documents can go end-to-end digital in 2026
| Document | IT Act position | Other formality | Fully digital? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Commercial agreements (MSA, NDA, SaaS, vendor) | Not excluded | Stamp duty by state | Yes, with e-stamp |
| Employment contracts, offer letters | Not excluded | Stamp duty in some states | Yes |
| Leave and licence / lease up to 11 months | Not excluded | Stamp duty; registration mandatory in Maharashtra for leave and licence | Yes for execution; registration per state |
| Lease exceeding one year | Not excluded | Registration mandatory (Registration Act s. 17(1)(d); TPA s. 107) | Execution yes; registration per state system |
| Agreement to sell immovable property | Not excluded since 2022 | Stamp duty; registration advisable (s. 17(1A)) | Execution yes; registration per state system |
| Sale deed / mortgage deed | Not excluded since 2022 | Registration mandatory (s. 17(1)(b)) | Execution yes; registration per state system |
| Loan agreement, DPN in favour of bank/NBFC | DPN carved out in 2022 | Stamp duty | Yes |
| DPN between private parties | Excluded | - | No |
| Power of attorney in favour of RBI/SEBI/IRDAI/PFRDA/NHB-regulated entity | Carved out in 2022 | Stamp duty; registration if it relates to immovable property | Yes for execution |
| General power of attorney | Excluded | - | No |
| Trust deed | Excluded | - | No |
| Will | Excluded | - | No |
How to use this in a document workflow
- Tag each template with its First Schedule status so the system refuses to route an excluded document for e-signature.
- For property and lease templates, add a post-signature registration task with the state and the responsible person.
- Put the e-stamp step before signature in every chargeable template.
- Keep the executed file, the stamp certificate and the signature audit trail together; since 1 July 2024 electronic records are proved under section 63 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023, which needs a certificate about the record and the system that produced it.
Where Legatio fits. Legatio executes the non-excluded documents above with Aadhaar eSign or DSC, tracks dispatch and signature status, and can carry a registration or stamping task on the same record. The First Schedule and Registration Act requirements apply on any platform.
Position stated as of October 2026. General information for business readers; registration procedures differ by state.