Can You Deduct Brokerage and Securities Transaction Tax (STT) From Capital Gains? A Tax Expert Explains
Vikram sold a batch of shares last year, made what looked like a healthy profit on his contract note, and sat down to calculate his tax by simply subtracting his purchase cost from his sale price. It felt straightforward enough, until his CA asked him a…
How to Invest in Gold Without Ever Holding Physical Gold: A Complete Guide
Meena’s mother has kept every gold coin she’s ever bought in a locker, and every time Meena visits, she hears the same story about how safe and reliable gold has always been for the family. Meena believes it too, gold has genuinely done well…
How Much Gold Can Your Family Legally Keep at Home Without Proof?
Lakshmi’s mother-in-law has a small steel almirah in her bedroom that’s been filling up with gold for over four decades, wedding jewellery, gifts from every birth in the family, pieces bought a little at a time whenever there was spare money.…
Post Office Tax Saving: Why PPF, SSY, NSC, KVP, and MIS Don’t All Save You the Same Tax
A neighbour of mine, a retired schoolteacher, once proudly told me she’d invested her Diwali bonus in Kisan Vikas Patra because “post office schemes save tax, don’t they?” She wasn’t wrong to trust the post office as a safe…
Salaried and Running a Side Business? Here’s Exactly How to Report Both in Your ITR
Nikhil has a stable 9-to-5 as a software engineer, and for the last two years, he’s also been building a small side business reselling curated home decor products on Instagram, doing everything from sourcing to packing orders himself on weekends.…
SMS Fraud Alert: How to Tell a Genuine Bank Message From a Scam
Deepak got a text one afternoon that looked exactly like every other alert his bank had ever sent him. Same sender name, same format, sitting right in the same conversation thread as his salary credit message from two days earlier. It said his KYC had…
ULIP Explained: What It Actually Is, How It Works, and How to Choose One Without Getting Confused
When Rahul’s insurance agent first pitched him a ULIP, the pitch sounded almost too good. One plan, he was told, that insures his life and grows his money in the market at the same time. Rahul liked the idea of not having to juggle a separate term…
ITR Filed Successfully? Here Are 8 Income Tax Notices the Department May Still Send You
Arjun filed his ITR in July, saw the “successfully verified” message on the portal, and mentally closed the chapter on taxes for the year. Three weeks later, an email landed in his inbox with the subject line “Intimation under Section…
Claiming Both HRA Exemption and Home Loan Interest Deduction: Know When It’s Allowed — and When It’s Not
Priya works in Mumbai, where she rents a small flat close to her office. Three years ago, she also bought a 2BHK back in Pune, where her parents live, taking a home loan she’s still paying EMIs on every month. When her CA first told her she could…
Family Floater vs Individual Health Insurance: Which Actually Saves You More
When Kavita and her husband sat down to buy health insurance for their young family, the agent laid out two options and made the choice sound almost obvious. A single family floater policy, one premium, one sum insured, covering Kavita, her husband, and…
