Residential status for income tax: resident, RNOR or NRI

Your residential status is worked out separately for each year. It decides which ITR you can use and whether income earned abroad is taxed in India.

Individuals: are you resident?

You are resident in a year if either of these is true:

1. You were in India for 182 days or more in the year.
2. You were in India for 365 days or more in the four years before, and 60 days or more in the year.

For Indian citizens leaving India for a job abroad or as ship crew, and for citizens or persons of Indian origin visiting India, the 60 days in test 2 becomes 182 days. For these visitors, there is a special rule when Indian income (other than from foreign sources) is above ₹15 lakh, with a 120-day threshold.

If neither test is met, you are a non-resident.

Deemed resident

An Indian citizen whose income, other than from foreign sources, is more than ₹15 lakh, and who is not liable to tax in any other country, is treated as resident. Such a person is “not ordinarily resident”.

Resident but not ordinarily resident (RNOR)

A resident is RNOR for the year if:

• they were a non-resident in 9 of the 10 previous years, or
• they were in India for 729 days or less in the previous 7 years.

Visitors caught by the 120-day rule and deemed residents are also RNOR.

HUFs, firms and companies

• HUF, firm or AOP: resident unless its control and management is wholly outside India.
• Company: resident if it is an Indian company, or if its place of effective management is in India.

From tax year 2026-27

Section 6 of the Income-tax Act, 2025 carries these tests, using “tax year” instead of “previous year”. We checked it against the Act as published in the Gazette of India.