The Income-tax Act, 1961 was repealed on 1 April 2026. From that date, the Income-tax Act, 2025 is the law that decides what you owe, and it renumbers almost every section you might already know by heart. It applies to income from tax year 2026-27 onwards. Income earned before 1 April 2026 is still taxed, filed, assessed and reassessed under the 1961 Act, which the 2025 Act keeps alive for those years. This page explains what actually changed, and the table below maps the sections VideshTax cites, old number to new.
What changed with the new Act
The rules an NRI cares about most — residency, TDS, capital gains, treaty relief — haven’t been rewritten from scratch. The 2025 Act mostly restates the same policy in a shorter, more logically ordered Act, with clauses grouped by topic rather than scattered across decades of amendments. What’s changed is the address of each rule: a section you might know as “54EC” or “195” now sits somewhere else entirely, under a different number, sometimes split across a table of sub-clauses rather than a single subsection.
A handful of provisions did change in substance, not just in number — the Finance Act, 2026 used the same moment to make a few real changes alongside the renumbering. The clearest example on this site: from 1 October 2026, a resident individual or HUF buying property from an NRI no longer needs a TAN to deduct TDS on the purchase. The PAN-based challan-cum-statement (Form 141) does the job instead. Companies, firms and non-resident buyers still need one. Where a page describes a rule like this, it’s telling you about the rule, not just a renumbering.
“Tax year” replaces “previous year” and “assessment year”
The 1961 Act ran on two overlapping years: the “previous year” you earned the income in, and the “assessment year” you filed and were assessed in — always one year apart, and a constant source of confusion for anyone not filing every year. The 2025 Act drops both terms and replaces them with a single tax year: the same 1 April–31 March period, named once. Tax year 2026-27 is both the year the income arose and the year the return covers — there’s no separate “AY 2027-28” to keep track of.
VideshTax uses “tax year” throughout, including on pages about income earned before the changeover, to keep one consistent label. Older material you find elsewhere — including plenty of guides still being updated across the web — may still say “previous year” (the same 12 months as a tax year) or “assessment year”, which is the year after the income. So AY 2027-28 means tax year 2026-27, and AY 2026-27 means income earned in 2025-26, which the 1961 Act still governs.
Why the old section numbers still matter
Citing only the new number would be tidier, but it would also cut readers off from everything written before 1 April 2026 — years of CBDT circulars, tribunal and court rulings, bank paperwork, and advice that all refer to the old numbering, and mostly still apply. A lower-deduction certificate approved under old section 197 stays valid for its tax year even though the certificate itself now sits under a different section. So every <Law> reference on this site shows both: the new section, and “was s. …” for the one you may already recognise, or need to match against something else you’re reading.
How to read the table
Each row below is one section VideshTax cites somewhere on the site: the old (1961 Act) number, the new (2025 Act) number, and a short description. Where a new number is still to come, the row says so; we match every number against the gazetted Act text.
The table is complete: every row is in the page’s HTML from the start, so it’s fully searchable — with a browser’s own find, a search engine, or a screen reader — whether or not JavaScript runs. The search box and status filter above it just narrow what’s shown; turn JavaScript off and every row is still there.
Every <Law> chip elsewhere on the site links straight to its row here, so if a guide cites a section you want to check against the primary source, follow the chip down to this table.
Sources
- Income-tax Act, 2025, as gazetted (s. 536 keeps the 1961 Act alive for earlier years)
- Finance Act, 2026, as gazetted (s. 87: the TAN exemption for resident individual and HUF buyers)
- CBDT Notification 121/2026, G.S.R. 830(E), 22 September 2026 (the property-purchase forms that replace the TAN route)
Old section → new section
67 sections this site cites, 1961 Act number to 2025 Act number. Search or filter below — every row stays in the page whether or not JavaScript runs.
No section matches that search or filter.
| 1961 Act | 2025 Act | What it covers | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| s. 2 | s. 2 | Definitions | Mapped |
| s. 2(29A) | s. 2(66) | Liable to tax in another country (includes a person later exempted) | Mapped |
| s. 2(29AA) | s. 2(67) | Long-term capital asset | Mapped |
| s. 2(34)/3 (previous year) | s. 3 | Definition of tax year | Mapped |
| s. 2(42A) | s. 2(101) | Short-term capital asset (holding period) | Mapped |
| s. 5 | s. 5 | Scope of total income | Mapped |
| s. 6 | s. 6 | Residence in India | Mapped |
| s. 6(1) | s. 6(2)-(5) | Residence of an individual (182-day and 60-day tests) | Mapped |
| s. 6(1A) | s. 6(7)-(8) | Deemed resident (citizen not liable to tax elsewhere) | Mapped |
| s. 6(6) | s. 6(13) | Not ordinarily resident (RNOR) | Mapped |
| s. 10(15)(iv)(fa) | Schedule IV Sl. 14 | Interest on FCNR deposits exempt for non-residents and RNORs (by reference to the 1961 clause) | Mapped |
| s. 10(4)(ii) | Schedule IV Sl. 1 | Interest on NRE account exempt for a person resident outside India (FEMA) | Mapped |
| s. 23 | s. 21 | Annual value of house property (municipal taxes, self-occupied homes) | Mapped |
| s. 24 | s. 22 | Deductions from income from house property (30%, interest) | Mapped |
| s. 24(b) | s. 22(1)(b), cap in 22(2) | Interest on borrowed capital; cap for self-occupied homes | Mapped |
| s. 45 | s. 67 | Capital gains (charge) | Mapped |
| s. 48 | s. 72 | Mode of computation of capital gains | Mapped |
| s. 50AA | s. 76 | Specified mutual fund and market-linked debenture gains treated as short-term | Mapped |
| s. 50C | s. 78 | Stamp duty value as sale consideration for land or building | Mapped |
| s. 54 | s. 82 | Profit on sale of property used for residence | Mapped |
| s. 54EC | s. 85 | Capital gains not charged on investment in certain bonds | Mapped |
| s. 54F | s. 86 | Capital gains on other assets invested in a residential house | Mapped |
| s. 55 | s. 90 | Meaning of cost of improvement and cost of acquisition (including the fair market value option for older assets) | Mapped |
| s. 56(2)(x) | s. 92(2)(m), 92(3) | Gifts of money or property: taxable above the threshold unless from a relative | Mapped |
| s. 70 | s. 108 | Set off of loss within the same head (capital losses against capital gains) | Mapped |
| s. 71(3A) | s. 109(1)(b) | Set-off of house-property loss against other income (capped) | Mapped |
| s. 74 | s. 111 | Carry forward and set off of capital losses | Mapped |
| s. 80 | s. 121 | Loss carried forward only if determined in a return | Mapped |
| s. 80C | s. 123 | Deduction for life insurance, PF, ELSS and similar | Mapped |
| s. 80D | s. 126 | Deduction for health insurance | Mapped |
| s. 80TTA | s. 153 | Deduction for savings-account interest | Mapped |
| s. 87A | s. 156 | Rebate for resident individuals on a smaller income | Mapped |
| s. 89A | s. 158 | Relief from tax on income from a notified-country retirement benefit account (e.g. US 401(k)/IRA), by election, until withdrawal | Mapped |
| s. 90 | s. 159 | Double taxation relief agreements (treaties) | Mapped |
| s. 91 | s. 160 | Relief where there's no treaty (unilateral foreign tax credit, residents) | Mapped |
| s. 111A | s. 196 | Tax on short-term capital gains in certain cases | Mapped |
| s. 112 | s. 197 | Tax on long-term capital gains | Mapped |
| s. 112A | s. 198 | Tax on long-term capital gains in certain cases (listed equity) | Mapped |
| s. 115A(5) | s. 207(8) | No return needed for a non-resident with only dividend/specified interest, TDS at full rate | Mapped |
| s. 115BAC | s. 202 | New (default) tax regime and the option to leave it | Mapped |
| s. 115C | s. 212 | Interpretation - NRI special provisions (investment income, NRI) | Mapped |
| s. 115E | s. 214 | Tax on investment income and LTCG (NRI) | Mapped |
| s. 115G | s. 216 | No return needed for an NRI with only investment income or LTCG, TDS deducted | Mapped |
| s. 119(2)(b) | s. 239(3)(b) | Condonation of delay (genuine hardship) — includes late e-verification | Mapped |
| s. 139 | s. 263 | Return of income and due dates | Mapped |
| s. 139(1) | s. 263(1) | Return of income and due dates | Mapped |
| s. 139(3) | s. 263(1)(a)(viii) | Return to carry forward a loss | Mapped |
| s. 139(4) | s. 263(4) | Belated return (after the due date) | Mapped |
| s. 139(5) | s. 263(5) | Revised return (substituted by Finance Act 2026, s.66(b)) | Mapped |
| s. 139(8A) | s. 263(6) | Updated return | Mapped |
| s. 139A | s. 262 | Permanent Account Number | Mapped |
| s. 140 | s. 265 | Return by whom to be verified | Mapped |
| s. 143(1) | s. 270(1) | Processing of the return and intimation | Mapped |
| s. 194-IA | s. 393(1) Table Sl. 3(i) | TDS on immovable property bought from a resident seller | Mapped |
| s. 195 | s. 393(2) Table Sl. 17 | TDS on other sums paid to non-residents | Mapped |
| s. 195(2) | s. 395(2) | Payer's application to AO to determine taxable proportion | Mapped |
| s. 195(6) | s. 397(3)(d) | Information on payments to a non-resident or foreign company (the remittance information form) | Mapped |
| s. 197 | s. 395(1) | Certificate for lower/nil deduction (payee's application) | Mapped |
| s. 203 | s. 395(4) | TDS certificate to deductee | Mapped |
| s. 203A | s. 397(1) | TAN requirement (and FA 2026 exemption for property bought from NRI, from 1 Oct 2026) | Mapped |
| s. 206AA | s. 397(2) | Higher TDS where no PAN | Mapped |
| s. 208 | s. 404 | Conditions of liability to pay advance tax | Mapped |
| s. 211 | s. 408 | Instalments of advance tax and due dates | Mapped |
| s. 234A | s. 423 | Interest for late filing of the return | Mapped |
| s. 234F | s. 428 | Fee for filing the return late (substituted by Finance Act 2026, s.96) | Mapped |
| s. 239 | s. 433 | Refund claimed only through a return | Mapped |
| s. 244A | s. 437 | Interest on refunds | Mapped |