The Invisible Defendant: Who Is Responsible When Artificial Intelligence Causes Harm In India?
- IJLLR Journal
- Apr 22
- 2 min read
Ayush Kumar Upadhyay, LLM, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Hyderabad
When a machine makes a mistake, the courtroom falls silent - not from shock, but from uncertainty. India's legal framework, built entirely around human accountability, has no answer for the age of artificial intelligence.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is no longer a fictional concept. Nowadays, AI is diagnosing our diseases, giving or denying us loans, and driving self-driving cars on the streets. But what would the issue be if an AI system injured someone? To whom is the law legally accountable? In India, the truthful response is that we don’t know. The laws we have today were designed in a world in which a human being made all significant decisions. They are not designed to handle a self-operating machine. This article examines the inadequacy of existing legal instruments in India and the actions of other nations. It offers a concise, viable, easy-out, and a new statute that will, at last, determine who pays when AI goes bad.
Take three actual Indian incidents. In 2024, an AI system produced a deepfake video, a digitally manipulated video that was totally convincing and realistic, of a well-known Indian journalist promoting fake medicines. The Delhi High Court was forced to intervene and make the government act. The same year, an AI bot was employed to duplicate a renowned Bollywood singer without his consent. The Bombay High Court halted it. And the first in India, a major news agency, in its initial litigation against an AI company, alleged that the company had used the agency's published articles to train its AI without permission.
In both instances, AI injured a real person. And in both instances, the Indian courts were wrestling with a fundamental question: who are we to blame?
This is not a far-off or minor issue. By 2027, the AI market in India will reach USD 17 billion. Hospitals, banks, courts, and government offices use AI. Human beings are influenced by AI daily, often without realizing it. Now, however, when an AI system harms you, the Indian law does not give a clear answer on who is liable to pay damages. This article addresses that gap.
