Unclaimed Indian Shares and Investments: Bay Area Recovery
San Jose, Fremont, Sunnyvale and Santa Clara hold a large, relatively recent Indian population — and a steady stream of inherited Indian shareholdings arriving with each generation of parents who stayed behind.
We recover those holdings: IEPF claims, physical certificates into demat, and transmission to legal heirs. The first assessment is free and nothing is charged in advance.
Claims from the San Francisco Bay Area, California, handled from our Gurugram office · Reviewed 21 September 2026
Recent migration, inherited paperwork
The Bay Area’s Indian community is dominated by people who arrived for the technology industry from the 1990s onward. Their Indian assets tend to be inherited rather than personal: a parent in Hyderabad, Chennai or Pune dies, and the family discovers share certificates alongside the property papers.
Because the shareholder lived in India and the claimant lives in California, these cases split across jurisdictions. The registrar deals with you wherever you are, but a legal heir certificate, where one is needed at all, comes from the revenue authorities of the state where your parent lived.
California notarisation and the Sacramento apostille
The United States has been party to the 1961 Hague Apostille Convention since 1981, and India joined in 2005. That makes authentication straightforward: a document you sign in the US is notarised locally and then apostilled, and no Indian consulate attestation is needed on top.
Apostilles on notarised documents are issued by the Secretary of State of the state where the notarisation took place, so a New Jersey notarisation is apostilled in Trenton and a California one in Sacramento. Federal documents go to the US Department of State. Send the original apostilled document to India; registrars want originals, not scans.
In California, documents are notarised by a California notary public and apostilled by the Secretary of State in Sacramento. The Consulate General of India in San Francisco serves the region, though an apostille removes the need to involve it for share documents.
What you will need
- Affidavit-cum-NOC and indemnity bond, signed before a US notary and apostilled by that state
- Passport, OCI card if you hold one, and PAN — the name should read the same on all three
- Proof of your US address for KYC
- A demat account in India, usually linked to an NRO account, opened before the claim is filed
Where the shares land, and moving money out
Recovered shares are credited to an Indian demat account. Shares inherited or bought while you were resident in India are generally held on a non-repatriable basis, which in practice means an NRO-linked account; your bank will confirm what applies to you.
From NRO balances, NRIs can remit up to USD 1 million per financial year, with Form 15CA and a chartered accountant’s certificate in Form 15CB. Separately, US persons have their own reporting to think about — FBAR on foreign financial accounts and Form 8938 thresholds — so speak to a cross-border tax adviser before you sell anything.
What we handle
Questions from the Bay Area
My father held shares in several companies. Do we need a separate claim for each?
Yes, each company and folio is handled separately, though the documents overlap heavily. It is worth listing every holding before you start: SEBI’s value thresholds apply per company, and a succession certificate covers only the securities named in it.
Nobody in the family is in India any more. Is that a problem?
No. The whole process can be run by courier and video verification. Where something requires a physical presence, a power of attorney to a trusted person in India usually covers it.
Are mutual fund holdings handled the same way?
Unclaimed mutual fund folios follow a related route through the AMC and its registrar rather than the IEPF. Tell us what you have found and we will say which process applies.
How do we know what the shares are worth before committing?
The registrar confirms the current holding for a folio, including everything added by bonus issues and splits. We do that check first, at no cost, so you can decide with a number in front of you.
Do you charge upfront?
No. An agreed percentage is charged after the shares are credited to your demat account, and government costs are paid by you at actuals.