Section 32: Voluntary Undertaking

Section 32: key takeaways

Who Section 32 applies to

Section 32 in plain language

Section 32 is the settlement route with real closure. During a Board inquiry, you can offer a binding commitment, to fix something, stop something, or publish the commitment, and if the Board accepts it, the Act bars further proceedings on those points.

That express bar is what makes it stronger than mediation: Section 31 gives no such guarantee, but a Section 32(4) acceptance does, at least for what the undertaking covers. It is not a blanket release for everything else.

The catch is symmetrical. Breaking any term is deemed a breach of the Act, and the Board can then move to a Section 33 penalty. So an undertaking is only worth offering if you are certain you can deliver every commitment in it.

Section 32 of the DPDP Act: full text

Wording summarised from the enacted Act. Always confirm against the official Gazette text for authoritative language.

What Section 32 means for your business

• Offer an undertaking only when you can deliver every term: because breach is deemed a breach of the Act, an overbroad or technically impossible commitment is worse than none.
• Scope it tightly to the specific issue in the proceeding: the Section 32(4) bar only covers the undertaking's contents, so a precise scope is a feature, not a weakness.
• Make it auditable: named owner, concrete action, Board-set deadline, evidence (config records, test results, processor confirmation, deletion certificates), and a monitoring cadence.
• Do not promise what the law forbids: you cannot undertake to delete records you must retain under tax, legal-hold or sectoral rules, and any variation later needs the Board's process and your consent.
• Weigh the trade-off honestly: certainty and closure now, against a binding, possibly published commitment whose breach revives penalty exposure. Not sure you can stand behind every term? Take the readiness assessment or find a specialist first.