After a long time of confusion around crypto in India, today the Finance Minister, Nirmala Sitaraman, has announced that all the crypto gains would be taxed at 30% and only the cost of acquisition would allowed as deduction from sale consideration. However, losses will not be allowed to be set of with other incomes. We would need to wait until the Finance Bill is released to analyze further on how this would work in practice.
However, the above cannot be construed to be completely legalizing crypto space in India, but rather just a move towards the same.
Further, from FY 2022-23 the RBI would be introducing the Digital Rupee which would be a centralized cryptocurrency controlled by the RBI. We would need to read through the Budget memorandum to understand the specifics of this introduction.
I will be reading through the Finance Bill and Budget memorandum and provide more details as the same is released. Stay tuned.