Notes on tax, GST and compliance
Plain-language explanations of the rules that affect taxpayers and small businesses — written and reviewed by the CA.
These notes exist because the same questions arrive over and over, and the honest answer to most of them is longer than a WhatsApp reply. Each one works through a rule as it actually applies — the section it sits under, the form it lands on, the dates that bind, and the mistake that most often triggers a notice.
Everything here is written for the person who has to file, not for other accountants. Where a threshold or a due date is stated, it is the one in force for the year named; where a position depends on facts, that is said plainly rather than smoothed over. Nothing on this page is advice on a specific situation — for that, the facts have to be looked at.
30 articles · last updated
Tax notices and assessments
What each notice actually is, how long you have to reply, and the procedural grounds worth checking before arguing the facts — from the intimation almost every filer receives to reassessment and search.
Section 143(2) Scrutiny Notice: Limitation and Defences
Your return has been selected for scrutiny. Before the merits, one question decides many of these cases: was the 143(2) notice issued within limitation — because the Supreme Court has held its absence is fatal, not curable.
Read the guideIncome Tax Search and Seizure: Block Assessment Rules
For searches conducted on or after 1 September 2024, assessment is under the reintroduced block assessment scheme rather than Section 153A. What changed, how a survey differs from a search, and what the safeguards are.
Read the guideNotice Under Section 142(1): What the Officer Can Ask For
The inquiry notice that precedes assessment. What the officer is entitled to call for, the limits on that power, the special-audit direction, and why ignoring it is the worst available option.
Read the guideSection 80GGC Notices: Political Donation Deductions
A 100% deduction with no monetary ceiling, verifiable against the donee's own filing. Why 80GGC became the centre of the refund crackdown, and what separates a valid claim from one that will not survive.
Read the guideSection 148 Reassessment Notice: Time Limits and Defences
Reassessment reopens a year you thought was closed. Before arguing the merits, three things decide many of these cases: whether the notice is within limitation, whether the monetary gate was crossed, and whether sanction came from the right authority.
Read the guideSection 143(1) Intimation: What It Means and What to Do
Almost every filer receives one, and most misread it as a notice. What the two columns actually compare, the adjustments CPC is permitted to make, and the difference between the 30-day window and the four-year one.
Read the guideRefund Adjusted Against an Old Demand: Section 245
A refund that never arrived, absorbed by a demand from a year you had forgotten. What Section 245 requires before that can happen, and why the underlying demand is so often wrong.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
Tax Notice on Deductions & Exemptions Claimed: What to Do
Salaried filers are receiving advisories and notices over deductions and allowances claimed in earlier returns. What the Department is actually doing, how to tell a real claim from an indefensible one, and the difference between a 50% and a 200% penalty.
Read the guideHRA Claims Under Scrutiny: What Evidence Actually Holds
House rent allowance is among the most examined salary exemptions. The computation, the two thresholds that create a paper trail, and what separates a claim that survives from one that does not.
Read the guide
Business tax, audit and filing
For proprietors, firms, LLPs and companies — which return applies, whether tax audit is triggered, and the deadlines that follow from that answer rather than from the form number.
Which ITR Form for Your Business: ITR-3, 4, 5 or 6
The form follows the entity and the basis of computation; the deadline follows audit liability, not the form. A decision path for proprietors, firms, LLPs and companies, with the dates that now apply.
Read the guideTax Audit Season: Due Dates and What Your Auditor Needs
For FY 2025-26 the audit report is due 30 September 2026 and the return 31 October. What decides whether audit applies, what late filing costs, and the records that hold the process up when they are missing.
Read the guideSection 44AD or Regular Books? The Five-Year Trap
Section 44AD removes the need for books and audit, but coming out of it triggers a five-year bar and can force an audit. Section 44ADA carries no such lock-in. The difference is worth understanding before electing either.
Read the guide
GST — registration, returns and credit
The compliance that recurs every month rather than once a year — registration thresholds and the compulsory cases, the return calendar and what being late now costs, and why input tax credit turns on GSTR-2B rather than on your invoice.
Input Tax Credit: Why GSTR-2B Decides What You Can Claim
Holding a tax invoice and having paid your supplier does not make the credit yours. Since January 2022, appearance in GSTR-2B is a statutory condition — and three further rules can take credit away after you have claimed it.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
GST Returns Are Now Time-Barred After Three Years
Non-filing used to mean an accumulating late fee. It can now mean the return becomes permanently unfilable — with the liability still outstanding and no clean route to regularise it.
Read the guideGST Registration: The Process, and the 30-Day Trap
Applying late is usually treated as a paperwork delay. It is not — missing the 30-day window from becoming liable permanently forfeits input tax credit on the stock you are holding when you register.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
GST Notices: From ASMT-10 to a Demand, and How to Reply
GST demands rarely arrive without warning. There is a sequence — automated mismatch intimation, scrutiny, pre-notice intimation, then the show-cause. Each rung has its own reply window, and answering early is far cheaper than defending late.
Read the guideGST Composition Scheme: When It Helps and When It Costs
The scheme is usually explained as a lower rate with less paperwork. The decision that actually matters is who your customers are — because a composition dealer selling to registered businesses is structurally more expensive than a regular one.
Read the guide
Foreign income, RSUs and ESOPs
For residents holding foreign shares through an employer plan, and for non-residents with Indian assets — the disclosure and credit rules that carry the heaviest penalties for getting them wrong.
TDS on Property Sale by NRI: Full Sale Value & Section 197
The buyer must deduct on the whole sale value, not the profit — often far more than the real tax. A Section 197 certificate, applied for before the sale, fixes it.
Read the guideSchedule FA From Your Broker Statement, Line by Line
Which figure on your equity-platform statement goes where in Schedule FA — and the calendar-year trap that catches most MNC employees.
Read the guideForm 67 & Foreign Tax Credit on US Dividends (India)
Tax withheld in the US and taxed again in India — the credit exists, but it is not automatic. Form 67 is the step people miss.
Read the guideMissed Schedule FA? The Revised Return Window Explained
Forgot to disclose foreign RSUs or a US brokerage account? For AY 2026-27 the revised-return window runs to 31 March 2027 — fixing it now is far cheaper than being asked later.
Read the guide
Bank finance and company compliance
Documentation lenders actually assess, and the statutory filings that follow incorporation — what banks and the Registrar expect, and what being late costs.
CMA Data vs Project Report vs DPR: Which Do You Need?
Three documents, routinely confused, and asking for the wrong one costs a cycle with the bank. What each answers, what goes inside, and how to tell them apart from the sanction letter.
Read the guideCMA Data Format: All Seven Statements, With a Worked Example
Form by form, what a bank actually wants in each CMA statement — worked through on one consistent set of numbers, including where Method I and Method II give different limits.
Read the guidePvt Ltd & LLP First-Year ROC Deadlines (and the Penalties)
The registration platform moves on after incorporation. These are the deadlines that start running the day your company exists — and what missing them costs.
Read the guide
Internal controls, IT audit and data protection
Where accounting systems meet audit and regulation — internal financial controls reporting, IT general controls, the audit trail requirement, and readiness for the DPDP obligations.
What Auditors Actually Test in IT General Controls
Access, change management, development and operations — what is examined in each, why a shared admin login undermines an entire audit, and where the audit trail rule fits in.
Read the guideIs IFC Applicable to Your Private Company? A Decision Tree
Your auditor has asked about internal financial controls. Whether the reporting requirement actually applies turns on three alternative tests — and on one proviso that a single late ROC filing can trip.
Read the guideDPDP Rules: What Applies to Your Company, and When
The Digital Personal Data Protection Rules are notified and the clock is running. The phased dates, what full compliance actually requires, and what is worth doing in the window that remains.
Read the guide
The Income-tax Act 2025 transition
The 1961 Act still governs the return you are filing now; the 2025 Act takes over from tax year 2026-27. What changes, which section numbers map to which, and when each applies.
Does the Income Tax Act 2025 Change Your FY 2025-26 Return?
The season's most common worry, settled in one table: the return you file this year is still under the 1961 Act.
Read the guideIncome Tax Act 2025: Old vs New Section Number Mapping
The sections you actually use, mapped 1961 → 2025 in one table. Bookmark it for the transition.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
Income Tax Act 2025 vs 1961: Which Applies to Your ITR?
A complete, plain-language comparison of the two Acts: tax-year terminology, which Act governs your return, the great renumbering (80C → 123), TDS consolidation and the Section 63 audit relief.
Read the guide
More articles on the Income-tax Act 2025 transition are being prepared and will appear here as they are reviewed and published.