Zerodha CKYC and re-KYC: how the statuses work
A Zerodha account relies on two separate KYC systems: CKYC , the cross-sector central registry run by CERSAI under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, and KRA KYC, the securities-market system run by five SEBI-registered KYC Registration Agencies under the SEBI (KYC Registration Agency) Regulations, 2011. The first gives you a portable 14-digit identifier; the second assigns the status, KYC Validated, KYC Registered or KYC On Hold, that actually controls whether and how you can trade through Kite . Re-KYC is the process of refreshing that securities-market record so it returns to Validated.
This matters because the two systems share a name and confuse people who treat them as one. Your CKYC record can be perfectly fine while your Zerodha account shows “KYC On Hold” at the KRA, or the reverse. The status that gates your trading is the KRA status, not the CKYC number. Since November 2022, the KRAs have run an extended independent verification of every securities-market KYC record, re-checking PAN, Aadhaar, address, mobile and email against the issuing sources in phases, and the result of that exercise is the status sitting on your account today.
The article sets out what CKYC is for a Zerodha client, how it differs from the KRA record, exactly when re-KYC is triggered, and what each of the three statuses, Validated, Registered and On Hold, means for your ability to trade. The statuses and their definitions below are quoted from the framework SEBI mandated through circular SEBI/HO/MIRSD/SECFATF/P/CIR/2024/41 dated 14 May 2024 and the joint KRA press release of 25 April 2024.
Conflict-of-interest disclosure. This guide is published by the WebNotes Editorial Team for informational purposes and is written independently. WebNotes operates a Zerodha account-opening referral programme, disclosed on the pages that carry the referral link; this guide does not carry it and earns no referral commission from the procedure described here.
CKYC versus KRA KYC for a Zerodha account
CKYC and KRA KYC are not two names for the same thing, and a Zerodha account touches both.
CKYC is the Central KYC Records Registry operated by CERSAI under Rule 9A of the PML (Maintenance of Records) Rules, 2005. It spans all four financial sectors, banking under the RBI, securities under SEBI , insurance under the IRDAI and pensions under the PFRDA, and identifies each record by a 14-digit KYC Identification Number. CERSAI was authorised as the registry by Gazette notification S.O. 3183(E) dated 26 November 2015, and the registry went live on 15 July 2016.
KRA KYC is the securities-market-only record, held by one of five SEBI-registered KRAs : CDSL Ventures (CVL KRA), NSDL Database Management (NDML KRA), CAMS, Karvy (KFin) and DotEx (NSE). When you open a Zerodha demat account or trading account , Zerodha uploads your KYC to a KRA, which assigns the status that governs your trading. Because the five KRAs are interoperable under the 2011 regulations, a record at any one of them is visible to all, so a broker does not need to register with all five.
The two link together. SEBI has directed the KRAs to upload securities-market KYC information into the CKYCRR, so a KYC done through your Zerodha onboarding also feeds the central registry. But the CKYC number tells you only that a record exists; the KRA status tells you what you can do with it. Hold this distinction through the rest of the article: when Zerodha says your KYC is “On Hold”, it is reporting the KRA status, and re-KYC fixes the KRA record.
The three statuses and what they mean
The KRAs classify every securities-market KYC record into a status based on how far the verification succeeded. As of 31 March 2024, the five KRAs together held KYC records of 10.83 crore investors, of which 73 per cent were KYC Validated, 15 per cent KYC Registered and 12 per cent KYC On Hold (Joint Press Release by all KRAs, 25 April 2024). The verification, run since November 2022, checks five attributes per the SEBI-mandated table.
KYC Validated
A record is KYC Validated when all of the following are authenticated: PAN is existing and valid; name and date of birth match the Income Tax Department records; name and address match the source XML or the QR-code data extracted from the e-Aadhaar, m-Aadhaar or scanned Aadhaar provided with the record; both email and mobile are validated through delivery or OTP; and the PAN-Aadhaar linkage response from the ITD is Yes or the PAN is otherwise operative for the investor’s category (KRA circular implementing SEBI/HO/MIRSD/SECFATF/P/CIR/2024/41, effective 1 June 2024).
In the words of the joint KRA release, a validated record is one whose “documents and KYC information submitted by the investor have been authenticated with the database of the issuing authority”, and the investor “can seamlessly transact in [the] securities market without the need for resubmission of KYC documents.” For a Zerodha client this is the clean state: you can open accounts and trade with any intermediary, no resubmission required.
KYC Registered
A record is KYC Registered when PAN and name-DOB are validated, but the source validation of name and address against Aadhaar “cannot be performed by KRAs / is not possible”, typically because the proof of address is an officially valid document other than Aadhaar (passport, driving licence, voter ID). Email and mobile are still validated.
The consequence, per the KRA release, is that there is “no impact to the investor with his / her existing intermediaries”, who “can seamlessly transact including continuity of the existing SIPs and KRA registered with MFs already.” But if the investor “wishes to open a new account or a new folio with a new MF / SEBI Registered Intermediary, [a] fresh set of KYC documents [is] to be collected afresh.” So a registered Zerodha client keeps trading on the existing account, but a fresh KYC is needed to open elsewhere. SEBI’s 14 May 2024 circular eased the earlier position so that completing KYC with a non-Aadhaar OVD no longer forces an On-Hold; it lands you at Registered instead.
KYC On Hold
A record is KYC On-Hold where the verification “could not be successful, primarily PAN-Aadhaar Seeding not done / failed or Email and / or Mobile validation has failed” (joint KRA release, 25 April 2024). This is the status that restricts transactions.
The action required is specific. If the cause is PAN-Aadhaar seeding, the investor must complete the seeding in income-tax records to make the PAN operative; the ITD has issued detailed guidelines on this. If the cause is email or mobile, the investor shares the updated email or mobile with any intermediary (a depository participant , broker or MF AMC), which lodges a modification request with the KRA; once the KRA receives and validates the latest information, it updates the status. For a Zerodha client, this is precisely what re-KYC does.
| Status | What it means | Can you trade? |
|---|---|---|
| KYC Validated | All attributes authenticated against the issuing source, including PAN-Aadhaar linkage | Yes, freely, across all intermediaries |
| KYC Registered | Verified on documents but address not source-validated against Aadhaar | Yes with existing intermediaries; fresh KYC to open a new account |
| KYC On Hold | A verification failed, usually PAN-Aadhaar seeding or mobile/email | Restricted until you fix the failed item and re-KYC |
When re-KYC is triggered
Re-KYC at Zerodha is triggered in three situations, and they correspond to the statuses above plus the periodic-refresh rule.
First, a status that is not Validated. If the KRA exercise has placed your record at Registered or On Hold, Zerodha prompts a re-KYC so that the corrected and re-verified particulars move you to Validated. A Registered status does not stop trading on the existing account, but you will be nudged to validate; an On Hold status does restrict you and must be cleared.
Second, a change in your KYC particulars. Updating your registered address , mobile number , email , name, signature or other core fields is a KYC modification that flows to the KRA, and the KRA re-verifies the changed field. A new address proof, for instance, is re-validated against its source.
Third, a periodic refresh mandated by risk category. Under the SEBI KYC framework and the PMLA, intermediaries periodically refresh KYC by client risk classification. SEBI’s master directions and the risk-based periodicity determine when a low, medium or high-risk client is due, and a due refresh surfaces as a re-KYC prompt in Console .
When any of these fires, Zerodha shows a re-KYC banner on the Console dashboard, and the flow is to review the updated KYC form, refresh the underlying Aadhaar document through DigiLocker if needed, and e-sign with an Aadhaar OTP. The mechanics are covered in how to re-KYC a Zerodha account and the status check in how to check your KYC status on Zerodha .
Where CKYC fits into the Zerodha re-KYC flow
During onboarding and re-KYC, Zerodha collects PAN and Aadhaar through DigiLocker so it can match the name on PAN against Income Tax Department records, match the Aadhaar photo against your in-person verification capture, and pull the Aadhaar address into your KYC record. If your Aadhaar data is stale, refreshing the Aadhaar document inside DigiLocker is the first step, but refreshing it there does not update Zerodha; a separate re-KYC is still required to push the corrected data to the KRA and, through it, to the CKYC registry.
So the CKYC number is the durable identifier that stays the same across all this, while the KRA status is the thing that moves, On Hold to Validated, when re-KYC succeeds. Knowing your CKYC number is useful for opening relationships elsewhere; clearing your KRA status is what unblocks trading on Zerodha.
See also
- CKYC number explained
- Central KYC Records Registry
- CERSAI
- KYC Registration Agency
- KRA ecosystem
- Zerodha KRA
- How to re-KYC a Zerodha account
- How to check your KYC status on Zerodha
- How to check KYC status on CAMS or KFin
- How to update KYC using DigiLocker
- How to update your address with the Zerodha KRA
- How to change your registered mobile number on Zerodha
- How to change your registered email on Zerodha
- How to update your signature on Zerodha
- How to verify PAN and Aadhaar on Zerodha
- Clients of special category (CSC)
- KYC for mutual funds
- CKYC for mutual funds
- DigiLocker
- Aadhaar
- PAN-Aadhaar linking
- Zerodha
- Zerodha Console
- Kite by Zerodha
- Demat account
- Trading account
- Depository participant
- In-person verification
- SEBI
External references
- SEBI: Master circular for KYC norms (KRA framework)
- NSDL: SEBI circular on review of validation of KYC records by KRAs and FAQs (2024)
- CDSL: Joint Press Release by all KRAs on the recent KYC changes (25 April 2024)
- Zerodha support: KYC re-activation and re-KYC
- CERSAI CKYC portal (ckycindia.in)
References
- SEBI circular SEBI/HO/MIRSD/SECFATF/P/CIR/2024/41 dated 14 May 2024 (review of validation of KYC records by KRAs; KYC Validated, Registered, On Hold framework).
- SEBI circular SEBI/HO/MIRSD/SECFATF/P/CIR/2023/169 dated 12 October 2023 (uniform standards for KYC validation by KRAs).
- Joint Press Release by all KYC Registration Agencies, 25 April 2024 (status definitions; 10.83 crore records, 73 per cent Validated, 15 per cent Registered, 12 per cent On Hold as of 31 March 2024).
- SEBI (KYC Registration Agency) Regulations, 2011 (KRA framework and interoperability).
- Prevention of Money-Laundering (Maintenance of Records) Rules, 2005, Rule 9A (CKYCRR filing and the CERSAI central registry).
WebNotes Editorial Team prepares factual reference entries based on publicly available regulatory documents and broker disclosures. WebNotes is not affiliated with Zerodha Broking Limited, SEBI, the KRAs, or CERSAI. Statuses, circulars and procedures are subject to change; verify current requirements at support.zerodha.com and on a KRA website before acting.