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Briefly
- India’s crypto trade is urgent for tax reduction forward of the Union Price range, warning that prime transaction taxes have pushed buying and selling offshore.
- About three-quarters of Indian crypto quantity now flows by way of international platforms, in keeping with KoinX, undermining home liquidity and oversight.
- Business teams are urging decrease TDS, loss set-offs, and clearer regulation to deliver exercise again onshore.
As India approaches this yr's Union Price range, policymakers are beneath strain to reassess the nation’s punitive crypto tax framework amid capital flight to offshore platforms, elevating questions on misplaced tax income and weakened regulatory oversight.
Indian crypto customers execute almost three-quarters of their crypto quantity offshore, round $6.1 billion (₹51,252 crore), with simply 27.33% remaining on home platforms, in keeping with a report from crypto tax platform KoinX.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is about to current her ninth consecutive funds on Sunday, a primary in over twenty years, with the crypto trade looking ahead to reduction from a tax regime that has gutted home buying and selling volumes and pushed exercise to international exchanges accessed through VPNs.
Regardless of rating first in grassroots crypto adoption in keeping with Chainalysis’ figures, India's tax-heavy, policy-light strategy has created a regulatory limbo that contrasts with structured frameworks rising throughout Asia.
"India's VDA ecosystem is at a pivotal stage, with rising adoption throughout the nation; nevertheless, the present tax framework presents challenges for retail contributors by taxing transactions with out recognising losses, creating friction relatively than equity," Ashish Singhal, co-founder of crypto trade CoinSwitch, instructed Decrypt.
The three broad requests for the 2026 Price range embrace tax rationalisation by way of “lowered Tax Deducted at Supply (TDS) and permitting loss set-offs; a regulatory mechanism for the sector; and inspiring blockchain adoption, each permissioned and permissionless,” Dilip Chenoy, Chairman of Bharat Web3 Affiliation, instructed Decrypt.
The 2022 tax hammer
In February 2022, the authorities introduced a 30% tax on crypto revenue, with no deductions or exemptions.
"No deduction in respect of any expenditure or allowance shall be allowed whereas computing such revenue besides value of acquisition," Sitharaman famous in her Price range 2022 presentation.
The minister specified that gifting of digital digital property could be taxed on the recipient's finish, whereas losses couldn’t be set off in opposition to some other revenue. Traders couldn't present losses from worth drops or hacking incidents to offset taxation on earnings.
The 1% TDS has hammered high-frequency merchants and liquidity suppliers who function on skinny margins, making their enterprise fashions unsustainable on home platforms.
The regime tightened within the 2025 Union Price range, when undisclosed crypto positive factors had been introduced beneath Part 158B of the Revenue Tax Act, enabling retrospective audits on transactions relationship again 48 months.
Traders who didn’t report positive factors face a 70% penalty on unpaid taxes.
Rationalisation, Not Rollback
A nationwide survey achieved by CoinSwitch revealed deep dissatisfaction with the present crypto tax framework.
Practically 66% of the 5,000 contributors contemplate the tax regime unfair, with 53% describing it as "very unfair,” and about 59% report lowered participation on account of taxation, in keeping with the report.
Over 80% search modifications within the upcoming Union Price range, 48% search a decrease tax price than 30%, 18% need the power to set off losses, 16% need lowered TDS, and a robust 61% favour taxing crypto equally to equities or mutual funds.
"A discount in TDS on VDA transactions from 1% to 0.01% may enhance liquidity, ease compliance, and improve transparency whereas preserving transaction traceability,” Singhal mentioned, including that rising the TDS threshold to about $5,444 (₹5 lakh) may defend smaller buyers from bearing an outsized tax burden.
In the meantime, CA Sonu Jain, chief danger and compliance officer at 9Point Capital, instructed Decrypt the present construction has “failed its twin goals of monitoring transactions and discouraging hypothesis.”
"As a substitute, it has resulted in a near-complete migration of VDA exercise to offshore platforms, the place transactions are neither successfully trackable nor regulated beneath Indian legislation," Jain mentioned.
"Paradoxically, the compliance burden has fallen disproportionately on law-abiding taxpayers who continued utilizing regulated platforms, and these customers have confronted elevated tax notices, scrutiny, and enforcement actions, which have created a notion of mistrust in the direction of trustworthy taxpayers," he mentioned.
"What India wants proper now could be a good, trust-based tax and regulatory framework. Crypto is a brand new asset class, and with out belief between taxpayers and the Income, enforcement will stay inefficient and counter-productive," he added.
Jain known as for revisiting how crypto losses are handled beneath Part 115BBH, noting they need to align with the taxation of shares and securities.
He additionally advised changing the 1% TDS with information-based reporting techniques like Assertion of Monetary Transactions, that are already utilized in capital markets.
“A proper regulatory framework, no less than for shopper safety and platform accountability, is important to revive confidence, deliver exercise again onshore, and enhance long-term tax compliance,” he added.
Aishwary Gupta, International Head of Funds & RWAs at Polygon Labs, instructed Decrypt the trade seeks “pragmatic coverage reset balancing innovation with safeguards.”
He additionally pointed to TDS discount as a possible lever, echoing Singhal's view that it may ease liquidity constraints and scale back incentives for offshore buying and selling.
He mentioned there’s a sturdy case to “revisit India’s flat 30% tax on crypto positive factors and permit loss set-offs,” saying it might deliver VDAs nearer to the tax therapy of conventional monetary property.
Apart from tax issues, the true precedence is regulatory readability, Gupta added, urging India to assist stablecoin funds and asset tokenisation beneath current funds and securities frameworks relatively than crypto-specific guidelines.
Enforcement Failures
Earlier this month, tax authorities introduced issues to the parliamentary standing committee of finance, citing enforcement challenges together with borderless transfers, pseudonymous addresses, and transactions exterior regulated banking channels, in keeping with a Instances of India report.
"The Finance Ministry desires to curb decentralisation, privacy-focused techniques, and offshore exchanges; the FIU and Revenue Tax Division are on the identical web page," a supply instructed Decrypt on the time.
International Divergence
India's punitive stance contrasts with different main economies, and different Asian jurisdictions like Japan and Hong Kong have moved towards structured licensing regimes to draw digital asset companies.
India’s Financial Affairs Secretary Ajay Seth acknowledged early final yr that India is reconsidering its crypto stance following main world shifts.
Nevertheless, the dialogue paper on digital property, initially set for a September 2024 launch, stays delayed.
"The deeper coverage danger is that sustained opposition with out a parallel regulatory pathway will push innovation, capital, and expertise offshore, leaving India as a shopper and tax collector of crypto exercise relatively than a rule-setter," Raj Kapoor, founder and CEO of the India Blockchain Alliance, beforehand instructed Decrypt.
Regardless of accumulating roughly $5.2 million (₹437.43 crores) by way of crypto taxation, India lacks significant regulatory frameworks to guard customers or foster innovation.
As Sitharaman prepares to current the Union Price range 2026, the crypto trade stays cautiously hopeful that the federal government will acknowledge structural flaws and contemplate reforms balancing income with investor safety and competitiveness of India's onshore crypto markets.
