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.
152 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.
Cornerstone 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 guideTDS Deducted but Not Deposited by Employer: You Keep the Credit
Form 16 says tax was deducted. Form 26AS says nothing arrived. The intimation denies the credit and raises a demand, or quietly eats a later refund. Section 205 has barred exactly that for decades, the Delhi High Court has now applied it three times to former Kingfisher staff, and the 2025 Act carries the bar forward as Section 401.
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 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 guideSection 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.
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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.
Cornerstone guide
Does Your Business Need a Tax Audit for FY 2025-26?
Most businesses find out from their accountant in September. The test is four questions on figures you already have — and the two routes into audit that the turnover number alone does not reveal.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
F&O and Intraday Turnover: The Number That Triggers an Audit
A trader with ₹4 crore of contract value and ₹80,000 of profit does not have ₹4 crore of turnover. Getting this wrong is what puts people into an audit they never needed.
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Shops and Establishments Registration in Karnataka
It is the registration most new businesses in Karnataka discover late — usually when a bank, a landlord or a marketplace asks for the certificate they never obtained.
Read the guideSection 44AD or Regular Books? The 5-Year Lock-In
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 guideTax Audit Due Date AY 2026-27: 21 Oct by Circular 7/2026
For FY 2025-26 the audit report is now due 21 October 2026 and the return 21 November, extended by CBDT Circular 7/2026. What decides whether audit applies, what late filing costs, and the records that hold the process up when they are missing.
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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.
Cornerstone guide
GSTR-9 and 9C for FY 2025-26: Who Files, and by When
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 guideCornerstone guide
Can't File an Old GST Return? The Three-Year Bar
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 guide57th GST Council on 7 October 2026: What Is on the Table
The first full sitting in a year, and the first since GST 2.0 finished the rate work. The agenda is plumbing: who gets registered how fast, what credit is blocked, how refunds move, and whether credit can follow a business across state lines. What is confirmed, what is reported, and what to do on the day.
Read the guideGST Notice Only Uploaded on the Portal: Is That Valid Service?
An ex parte order for a notice that only ever existed on a portal tab you did not open. Three High Courts this summer held that is not service at all. The Supreme Court has issued notice on the same question. What that does to your order, your appeal clock, and when the ground is already gone.
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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.
Cornerstone guide
Buying Property in Dubai as a Resident Indian: LRS, TCS and Tax
A resident Indian can buy property in Dubai, but only with money sent under the Liberalised Remittance Scheme, within USD 250,000 per person per year, and with 20% TCS on most of it. The purchase also starts a reporting duty in every return for as long as you hold the flat, and leaving it out is the most expensive omission on the form.
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FAST-DS 2026: Window Open Until 31 December
The window opened on 16 August 2026 and closes on 31 December. Foreign assets you never reported settle at 60% of value against the 120% the Black Money Act charges — or a flat ₹1 lakh on narrower facts.
Read the guideForeign National Living in India: You Get No 182-Day Relief
Most expatriate tax guidance quotes 182 days. That number comes from a relief written only for citizens and people of Indian origin. For everyone else the threshold is 60 days, and an employment visa does not change it.
Read the guideDubai Off-Plan Payment Plans: LRS Limits and No Foreign Mortgage
An off-plan payment plan is set in dirhams and percentages; the Indian limits that apply to it are set in dollars per person per financial year. Mapping one onto the other before signing shows whether the plan fits, what TCS each instalment carries, and what happens if a buyer moves abroad or the purchase is cancelled.
Read the guideRent From a Dubai Flat: How India Taxes It
The UAE does not tax your rent, so India taxes all of it with nothing to credit. How the dirham rent becomes a rupee figure, what can be deducted, the two Schedule FA entries it needs, and what FEMA says about leaving it in Dubai.
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NRI money, property and repatriation
For non-residents with money, property or an inheritance in India — which account it sits in, the USD 1 million limit, the certificates the bank asks for, and the tax that has to be cleared before any of it leaves.
Cornerstone guide
Repatriating Money From India as an NRI: The Full Route
Every repatriation runs the same five gates in the same order: what the money is, which account holds it, which FEMA limit applies, whether the tax is settled, and what the bank needs to see. Get the first one right and the other four follow.
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NRI Selling Property in India: The Tax, and How to Cut It
The exemptions are not restricted to residents. What defeats them is timing — almost every one has to be set up before the sale deed, not discovered at the return.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
Form 15CA/15CB Is Now 145/146: When You Need a CA
Read the guideTDS on Rent Paid to an NRI: 31.2%, and No Threshold
Resident landlord: 10% above ₹6 lakh. Non-resident landlord: a different section, no threshold, and roughly three times the rate — on rent whose real tax is often nil. The lower-deduction certificate is the whole answer, and it has to be in place first.
Read the guideGifts Between NRIs and Family in India: Tax and FEMA
A gift from a relative is not taxed in India in either direction, but that is only one of four questions. The route FEMA allows, the TCS the bank collects on the way out, the two different definitions of 'relative', and the clubbing rule that taxes the giver on what the gift later earns.
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Foreign-owned companies in India
For foreign parents and founders — choosing the entry route, incorporating with directors abroad, bringing in the capital, and the year-round compliance an Indian subsidiary carries under the Companies Act, FEMA, income tax and GST.
Cornerstone guide
Indian Subsidiary Compliance Calendar, FY 2026-27
A wholly-owned Indian subsidiary answers to four regulators on four different clocks, and this year to two Income-tax Acts at once. Every date from April 2026 to March 2027, month by month, and which ones move.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
Setting Up a Company in India as a Non-Resident
Most sectors take 100% foreign ownership with no prior approval; what actually delays an India entry is the resident director and, for some investors, Press Note 3. The order of decisions, the 2026 changes, and where each step is covered in detail.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
FC-GPR, FLA and APR: The FEMA Filings Companies Miss
Taking money from a non-resident starts a 30-day clock most founders never hear about. What each filing is, when it falls due, and why the three-year Late Submission Fee window is the line that matters.
Read the guideStatutory Audit of a Foreign Subsidiary in India: CARO, Ind AS
The parent wants a December reporting pack under IFRS or US GAAP; Indian law wants March statutory accounts, a CARO report and a tax audit. How the two fit together, what applies to a subsidiary of a foreign company, and how to run it on one set of fieldwork.
Read the guideClosing an Indian Subsidiary: Strike-Off, Liquidation, Capital
Strike-off is cheap and suits a company with nothing left in it. If there is capital to send back to the parent, the answer is usually liquidation, and the order of work matters more than either route.
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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.
Cornerstone guide
CMA Data: Who Prepares It and How the Bank Reads It
Most explanations stop at what CMA data contains. The harder questions are who is allowed to prepare it, and what happens to it after it reaches the branch.
Read the guideMissed CCFS-2026? What AOC-4 and MGT-7 Now Cost, and the Dates
For five months, overdue annual filings could be cleared at a tenth of the additional fee with immunity from penalty. That ended on 15 September. What the full price looks like, why the three-year disqualification clock matters more than the fee, and the FY 2025-26 dates that are now the priority.
Read the guideCMA Data for a Proprietorship: What the Bank Accepts
The seven statements are the same. What differs is the evidence behind them — a proprietor has no statutory audit, often files on a presumptive basis, and the bank has to decide what to believe.
Read the guideStock Statement and Drawing Power on a CC Limit
The sanction letter says Rs 50 lakh. The bank lets you use Rs 38 lakh. The gap is drawing power — computed every month from a statement most borrowers fill in carelessly, and which can turn the account irregular without a rupee of default.
Read the guideCMA Data for a Cash Credit Renewal: What the Bank Rechecks
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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.
DPDP 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 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 guideYour Auditor Wants User Lists and Backup Logs. Here's Why
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.
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Service exports, GCCs and professionals
For IT, consulting and professional firms billing abroad — what makes a supply an export, the deeming provision that treated exports as local sales until it was removed, refunds on zero-rated supplies, and the transfer pricing questions a captive faces.
Cornerstone guide
Export of Services: Realisation, FIRC and the GST Refund
Zero-rating gets you the invoice out. Getting the refund, and staying inside FEMA, both turn on a document the exporter usually only thinks about afterwards.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
Form 3CEB Due 31 October 2026, Then Form 48: TP Filings
The report due this October is still Form 3CEB under the 1961 Act. The transfer pricing chapter and its forms have been renumbered for tax year 2026-27 onwards, and most of what is online mixes the two.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
GCC and Captive Unit Taxation in India
The entity has one customer, no third-party revenue and no pricing power. Almost every tax question it faces is therefore about a transaction with its own parent — which is the hardest kind to defend.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
Intermediary Services GST: Section 13(8)(b) Omitted
For nine years an Indian firm earning foreign exchange for arranging business abroad was deemed to be supplying in India. That deeming provision has been deleted — but only prospectively.
Read the guideSection 92CE Secondary Adjustment: Now Section 170
The transfer pricing adjustment is not the end of it. If the money stays abroad, it becomes a deemed loan carrying interest — and the rate the old rule points at no longer exists.
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All 14 articles on service exports, gccs and professionals →
Manufacturing and industry
For factories and industrial units — the payment rule that disallows a deduction at 31 March, credit blocked on the buildings you construct, job work, scrap, refunds when your inputs are taxed higher than your output, and distributing credit across states.
Cornerstone guide
MSME 45-Day Payment Rule: The Deduction You Lose
Every other payment in this section can be saved by paying before you file. This one cannot. If the supplier is unpaid at 31 March, the deduction moves to next year and nothing you do in between changes it.
Read the guideGST on Job Work: Challans, Time Limits and Rates
The relief is conditional on return within a fixed period. When it lapses, the supply is deemed to have happened on the date of despatch — with interest running from then, not from when you noticed.
Read the guideGST TDS on Scrap Sales: The 2% Deduction, and Reverse Charge
Scrap sales used to be the least interesting line in a manufacturer's return. Two changes turned the buyer into a deductor and, in some cases, into the person paying the tax.
Read the guideInverted Duty Structure Refund: What You Can Claim
The formula is the whole subject. It excludes input services, it apportions by turnover, and it leaves a residue that no amount of correct filing will recover.
Read the guideITC on Factory Construction: Where 17(5) Blocks It
For a few months, a building used for a taxable business could qualify as plant and carry credit. Then the wording was changed retrospectively to a date seven years earlier.
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Real estate, JDAs and development
For landowners and developers — where the income tax and GST treatments of a joint development agreement diverge, what crystallises at the completion certificate, and the positions worth fixing before an agreement is signed rather than after.
Cornerstone guide
RERA Compliance for Promoters in Karnataka: The Full Calendar
Registration is the easy part. After it come four quarterly updates a year, a certificate before every withdrawal, an annual audit report, and a set of events that each carry their own form and their own penalty.
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JDA Taxation: Income Tax and GST on Joint Development
The landowner's adviser sees capital gains. The developer's adviser sees GST. Neither sees the whole transaction — which is why JDA disputes usually start with something both sides thought the other had handled.
Read the guideK-RERA Form-7 Annual Audit: FY 2025-26 Due 15 November 2026
Every registered project in Karnataka needs a Form-7 for FY 2025-26, signed by the promoter's statutory auditor and uploaded with the audited accounts by 15 November 2026. K-RERA has already fined promoters a fixed amount per project for missing the last two years.
Read the guideK-RERA Quarterly Progress Report: Q2 Due 15 October 2026
Every registered project in Karnataka files a quarterly update within fifteen days of the quarter end, and for FY 2026-27 each late one costs Rs 25,000. The figures in it are public, and they are compared with the annual audit report and with GST returns.
Read the guideRERA Project Extension and Delay Interest: Karnataka Promoters
A RERA registration runs to the completion date the promoter declared, and extending it is an application, not a formality. The allottees' right to interest runs on a separate clock that the extension does not stop.
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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.
Cornerstone guide
Capital Gains Under the Income-tax Act 2025: New Sections
Section 45 becomes 67, Section 54 becomes 82, and the rollover exemptions now sit at 82–89. Rates and holding periods are unchanged — but buyback taxation is not.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
Income Tax Notices Under the New Act: Section Numbers
An old section number on a notice for a past year is correct, not a defect — and a fresh 1961-Act notice can still issue today. Here is how to tell which track your notice is on.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
NRI Taxation Under the Income-tax Act 2025
Residency still decides everything, and Section 6 keeps its number. What moved is the NRI chapter, DTAA relief and the withholding rules — plus one property trap that catches nearly every buyer.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
Old vs New Tax Regime Under the Income-tax Act 2025
Section 202 is the default and Section 156 gives a ₹60,000 rebate up to ₹12 lakh. The old regime survives as an opt-out — and for a narrow band of taxpayers it still wins.
Read the guideCornerstone guide
Section 80C Is Now Section 123: Deduction Mapping Guide
The complete Chapter VI-A old-to-new table — same deductions, same limits, new section numbers. Plus the point most mappings skip: under the default regime, most of them are not available at all.
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More articles on the Income-tax Act 2025 transition are being prepared and will appear here as they are reviewed and published.