Nirmala Sitharaman: "India will keep current rules for cryptocurrencies for 2023"

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Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that the country's government will maintain a restrictive tax policy on the cryptocurrency sector for the 2023 financial year.

During the discussion in parliament of the budget forFiscal year 2023 Nirmala Sitharaman said that the department plans to leave unchanged the current tax rules adopted by the regulator in relation to crypto assets and industry participants.

The position of the Indian Ministry of Finance will remain despite the significant drop in cryptocurrency trading volumes caused by the introduction of 30% income tax and 1% withholding tax (TDS).

Strict regulatory restrictions have forcedthe country's crypto community to transfer its trading activities to international exchanges. In this regard, a number of industry players contacted the Ministry of Finance with a request to reconsider the position regarding cryptocurrency taxes, in particular TDS, setting it in the range from 0.01% to 0.1%. 

According to the Vice President of the Indian ExchangeWazirX Rajagopal Menon, the lack of any changes in the tax policy for cryptocurrencies has put Indian crypto companies in an extremely difficult situation. However, despite the hopes of some in the crypto industry for possible tax cuts, no changes were made to existing fiscal rules in 2023.

Moreover, previously the management of the Reserve BankIndia stated that the crypto market cannot be legalized, since the definition of “cryptocurrency” is very vague, and all digital coins are analogous to gambling.