India: Adopted financial data localisation requirement in Companies (Accounts) Rules 2014

On 31 March 2014, the Ministry of Corporate Affairs adopted the Companies (Accounts) Rules 2014, outlining data localisation requirements for “books of account”. In particular, section 3 of the Rules states that the “books of account” and documents containing relevant information related to them that are kept in electronic form have to “remain accessible in India”. Furthermore, the Rules stipulate that the back-ups of “books of account” kept in electronic form, including those outside the country, should be stored periodically in “servers physically located in India”. The Rules will be implemented on 1 April 2014.