Independent Research on Mutual Funds, Stocks & IPOs for Indian Investors

Last Reviewed and Updated: 17 Aug 2026 Inheriting shares or mutual fund units feels, in the moment, like a transfer of ownership. For tax purposes, Indian law treats it as something closer to nothing having happened at all. The cost basis used to calculate capital gains when those shares are eventually sold does not reset to their value on the day of inheritance. It reaches back to whatever the original owner actually paid, sometimes decades earlier, long before the heir who

Last Reviewed and Updated: 17 Aug 2026 A father transfers shares worth Rs 20 lakh to his daughter. No money changes hands, no sale happens on any exchange, and yet that single transfer quietly raises questions governed by several different tax provisions, each with its own answer. Is the gift itself taxed. What happens, tax wise, years later when the daughter eventually sells those shares. And does the income those shares generate in the meantime actually belong to the daught

Last Reviewed and Updated: 17 Aug 2026 Ask an NRI in Dubai, one in New York and one in London what their India tax treaty actually does for them, and you get three very different answers, because the treaties themselves are solving three very different problems. The India UAE treaty exists mostly to allocate taxing rights between two countries, one of which, until recently, barely taxed individuals at all. The India US treaty operates inside a system where the United States t

Last Reviewed and Updated: 17 Aug 2026 Mutual fund gains are one of the most common sources of confusion in income tax filing. The gains exist in a statement from CAMS or KFintech, expressed in numbers that the investor often does not fully understand. The ITR-2 form has multiple schedules, and it is not immediately obvious which row or which section should receive each number. The tax rates differ by fund type, by holding period, and by when the units were purchased. Switche

Last Reviewed and Updated: 17 Aug 2026 You had a good year in the market. You redeemed a mutual fund that had grown significantly, sold some equity, or received dividends from several companies. The gains are real and the money is in your account. The tax return is due in July and you plan to declare everything there. There is nothing more to do before that, right? For many investors, this assumption is correct. For those whose tax liability from investment gains is large eno

Last Reviewed and Updated: 17 Aug 2026 Most investors who take tax planning seriously have filled their Section 80C limit long before March arrives. The Rs 1.5 lakh bucket gets distributed between PPF, ELSS, life insurance premiums, and home loan principal repayment without much deliberation. The form goes to the payroll team, TDS is adjusted, and the job feels done. It is not done. Section 80C is the most visible deduction in Indian tax law, but it is far from the only one.

Last Reviewed and Updated: 17 Aug 2026 Filing an income tax return feels like the end of a process. You have gathered your documents, entered your numbers, computed your tax, paid what was owed, and clicked submit. The acknowledgement number appears on the screen. The anxiety of the deadline recedes. But for most taxpayers, particularly those expecting a refund, the filing is not the end. It is the beginning of a second process that can last anywhere from three weeks to sever

Last Reviewed and Updated: 17 Aug 2026 Choosing the wrong ITR form is one of the most common and avoidable filing mistakes Indian investors make. It leads to defective return notices, unnecessary correspondence with the income tax department, and in some cases requires refiling, which adds stress to an already administratively demanding process. The confusion is understandable: the form names are similar, the eligibility conditions involve several criteria at once, and there

Last Reviewed and Updated: 17 Aug 2026 Stock market income comes in three fundamentally different legal categories, and each is reported differently in the income tax return. Delivery-based equity trades generate capital gains, taxed at flat rates under Section 111A or 112A. Futures and options trading generates non-speculative business income, declared in Schedule BP of ITR-3 alongside a profit and loss statement. Intraday equity trading generates speculative business income