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Notice to ICICI Bank for excluding visually impaired from digital banking

The Delhi High Court (HC) has issued a notice to the ICICI Bank in relation to a plea alleging that the bank's website and application are inaccessible to visually impaired people, reported Bar and Bench. In a plea filed by lawyer Anchal Bhatheja and businessman Rahul Jain, Justice Vikas Mahajan also sought a response from the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, and the Reserve Bank of India, according to LiveLaw. What does the plea say? The petitioners allege that the ICICI's Mobile Pay app, its website, and InstaBIZ app fall short of accessibility standards, making it difficult for visually impaired people to independently carry out essential financial activities such as logging in, accessing account statements, carrying out transactions, adding payees, etc. 'Given that the ICICI banking ecosystem—and the banking sector at large—increasingly relies on digital interfaces as the primary mode of service delivery, the exclusion of persons with disabilities from these platforms effectively denies them equal access to critical financial infrastructure,' the petitioners said, as quoted by LiveLaw. They added that due lack of accessibility, people with disabilities have to seek sighted assistance, compromising their privacy, autonomy and dignity. It also makes them vulnerable to financial fraud and emotional distress, Bar and Bench reported. The plea argues that the lack of basic features violates their fundamental rights under Articles 14 (equality), 19 (freedom), and 21 (right of life and liberty) of the Constitution. They also stated that the bank is in violation of the Supreme Court's ruling in Pragya Prasun vs Union of India, where the court affirmed that digital accessibility is an integral part of the fundamental right to life and liberty under Article 21 of the Constitution.