How to switch tax regime

Switching between the old and new tax regimes is done in the income-tax return itself, and for a salaried central government employee or pensioner it takes a few minutes and needs no separate form. The choice is governed by Section 115BAC(6) of the Income-tax Act 1961 for the assessment year 2026-27, and it splits taxpayers into two groups that are treated very differently. A person with no business or professional income chooses afresh every year in the return. A person with business or professional income files Form 10-IEA under Rule 21AGA of the Income-tax Rules 1962, and gets one return ticket only.

Three facts carry most of the weight. The new tax regime is the default under Section 115BAC(1A), so making no choice is a choice of it. The old regime can be elected only in a return furnished under Section 139(1), which means on time, because both limbs of Section 115BAC(6) run through that sub-section. And the regime intimated to the drawing and disbursing officer at the start of the year governs only the tax deducted from monthly salary, never the final liability.

This guide sets out the mechanics: the eight steps, the four due dates that Section 5 of the Finance Act 2026 rewrote, which return form to open, and the two ways a regime choice made correctly can still be destroyed after filing. For the prior question of which regime is cheaper, see the old versus new tax regime comparison, which works the break-even through at each salary level.

For readers arriving in the 2026 filing season, one date matters more than the rest. The Section 139(1) due date for a salaried filer and a pensioner for the assessment year 2026-27 was 31 July 2026, and it has passed without extension. What that leaves open is set out below.

Conflict-of-interest disclosure. Salary-Calculator.in has no affiliate, referral, or paid arrangement with any tax-filing service, portal, or advisory firm, and this guide is written independently to inform the reader. It states the position for the assessment year 2026-27 (financial year 2025-26). Figures and dates are those in the cited orders, and the governing Office Memorandum, rule, or statute prevails in case of any difference. Tax rules change annually, so confirm the current position on the income-tax e-filing portal, and for a complex situation, or a large amount, consult a Chartered Accountant before filing.

Step-by-step procedure

The switch is eight steps, listed in the procedure box above and expanded here. Steps 1, 2, 4, 5, 7 and 8 apply to everyone. Step 3 applies during the financial year rather than at filing, and step 6 applies only where there is business or professional income.

1. Compute the tax both ways before deciding

Work the liability out under both regimes on actual figures. The new regime charges lower rates and carries a Section 87A rebate raised to Rs. 60,000 by the Finance Act 2025, which makes a total income up to Rs. 12 lakh tax-free, with a standard deduction of Rs. 75,000 taking the salaried threshold to Rs. 12.75 lakh. It allows only six deductions. The old regime charges higher rates but allows the full set, including Section 80C, health insurance under Section 80D, the house rent allowance exemption and interest on a self-occupied house.

Below a salary of Rs. 12.75 lakh the comparison is short, because no quantity of old-regime deductions beats a nil liability. Above it the old regime needs a large deduction total merely to draw level: Rs. 5,43,750 at a gross salary of Rs. 15 lakh, and a flat Rs. 8,00,000 once gross salary passes Rs. 24.75 lakh, where both regimes tax the marginal rupee at 30%.

2. Establish whether there is business or professional income

This is the fork, and it is decided by the head under which income is reported, not by its size. Income from salary, pension, house property, other sources and capital gains leaves the taxpayer on the simple route, choosing in the return with no form. Any receipt reported under the head profits and gains of business or profession, including a modest consultancy or freelance fee, moves the taxpayer onto the Form 10-IEA route and into the once-only restriction. A pensioner who also runs a business or profession falls on the second side of the line.

3. Intimate the regime to the drawing and disbursing officer

At the start of the financial year the employer asks each employee which regime is intended, so that tax deducted at source from monthly salary is computed correctly. Paragraph 4 of CBDT Circular No. 4/2023 dated 5 April 2023 directs, under Section 119, that “a deductor, being an employer, shall seek information from each of its employees having income under section 192 of the Act regarding their intended tax regime”. Give the drawing and disbursing officer that intimation. Where none is given, paragraph 5 provides that the employee is presumed to remain in the default regime and tax is deducted at the Section 115BAC(1A) rates.

4. Open the correct return form

For the assessment year 2026-27 a resident and ordinarily resident individual files ITR-1 (Sahaj) where total income is up to Rs. 50 lakh and arises from salary or pension, up to two house properties, other sources, long-term capital gains under Section 112A up to Rs. 1.25 lakh, and agricultural income up to Rs. 5,000. Cross any of those limits and ITR-2 applies. ITR-3 and ITR-4 arise only with business or professional income. The forms were notified on 30 March 2026 by Notifications No. 45/2026 to 51/2026.

5. Answer the opt-out question in the return

The election is a single field. In ITR-1 it is item (A20), “Do you wish to exercise the option u/s 115BAC(6) of Opting out of new tax regime? (default is ‘No’)”. Answer Yes to be taxed under the old regime; leave it at No for the new regime. For a salaried person or pensioner without business income this one answer is the whole of the switch, repeated afresh each year. ITR-1 asks no Form 10-IEA question, because the form has no application to that filer.

6. File Form 10-IEA first where there is business income

A taxpayer with business or professional income who wants the old regime files Form 10-IEA electronically before filing the return, then quotes its acknowledgement number and date in the return. ITR-4 carries the instruction on the form itself, at field (A23): the old regime “can be chosen by opting out of new regime u/s. 115BAC(6) by filing form 10IEA, which should be exercised on or before the due date for furnishing the return of income u/s 139(1)”. The form is filed once, not annually, because clause (i) of Section 115BAC(6) provides that the option applies to subsequent assessment years until withdrawn.

7. File on or before the Section 139(1) due date

This is the step that most often goes wrong, and Section 5 of the Finance Act 2026 made it easier to get wrong by splitting the old single non-audit date in two. The four dates for the assessment year 2026-27 are set out in the next section. A return filed after the applicable date is a belated return under Section 139(4) and cannot carry the old regime.

8. Verify within 30 days of uploading

Uploading is not filing. Complete e-verification within 30 days by Aadhaar one-time password, net banking, demat account, bank account, digital signature certificate, or by posting a signed ITR-V to the Centralised Processing Centre, Income Tax Department, Bengaluru 560500. Verification beyond 30 days does not merely delay processing; it moves the date on which the return is treated as furnished, with the consequence described below.

The four due dates under Section 139(1)

Section 5 of the Finance Act 2026 (No. 4 of 2026, assented 30 March 2026) substituted Explanation 2 to Section 139(1) with effect from 1 March 2026 and replaced the single non-audit date with a four-row table. For the assessment year 2026-27 the dates are:

The distinction that catches people is the third row against the second. What separates them is liability to audit under Section 44AB, not the return form used and not the nature of the income. Filing ITR-3 does not by itself mean 31 October 2026. A government employee with consultancy receipts, not liable to audit, works to 31 August 2026, which is neither the salaried date nor the audit date.

Where the 2026 filing season now stands

For a salaried central government employee or a pensioner, the door to the old regime for the assessment year 2026-27 has closed. The due date under the fourth row of the table was 31 July 2026, no order under Section 119 extending it has issued, and both limbs of Section 115BAC(6) run through Section 139(1). A person who has not yet filed for that year can now file only a belated return under Section 139(4), which is confined to the new regime.

Two routes remain for such a person, and both are contested or discretionary. Where an original return was filed on time, a revised return under Section 139(5) may be attempted, on the tribunal reasoning set out below. Otherwise an application for condonation of delay under Section 119(2)(b) is the only avenue, and it turns on the authority being satisfied of genuine hardship.

A filer with business or professional income not liable to audit is in a different position, with the 31 August 2026 date still ahead at the time of writing. For that filer Form 10-IEA must be filed before the return and before that date.

Belated returns and why the old regime is lost

A belated return cannot carry the old regime, and the reason is structural rather than punitive. Clause (i) of Section 115BAC(6) requires the option to be exercised on or before the due date specified under Section 139(1). Clause (ii) requires it to be exercised along with the return of income furnished under Section 139(1). A belated return is furnished under Section 139(4), which is a different sub-section, so neither limb is satisfied and the taxpayer remains in the default regime under Section 115BAC(1A).

The cost is asymmetric. The Section 234F fee is Rs. 5,000, or Rs. 1,000 where total income does not exceed Rs. 5 lakh. The loss of the old regime, for a taxpayer whose deductions made it the cheaper option, is frequently many times that. A taxpayer at a gross salary of Rs. 20 lakh with Rs. 7,50,000 of deductions loses the difference between the two computations, not Rs. 5,000.

Revised returns: a contested route

Whether the regime may be changed in a revised return is genuinely unsettled, and a reader should be told the state of the dispute rather than a clean answer. Section 115BAC(6)(ii) ties the option to the return furnished under Section 139(1) and says nothing about Section 139(5). The question is whether a valid revised return substitutes the original for that purpose.

The department’s practice is settled and negative. The Centralised Processing Centre declines the change and processes the revised return under the regime chosen in the original, its recorded reason being that a taxpayer “is not allowed to change tax regime in revised/corrected return”. Every reported tribunal decision located has gone the other way. In Manmohan Singh v. ITO, Ward 1(2), Dehradun, ITA No. 92/DDN/2026, the Delhi Bench of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal held on 3 August 2026 that a revised return filed within time under Section 139(5), shifting from the new regime to the old, is valid, applying Dhampur Sugar Mills Ltd. v. CIT [1973] 90 ITR 236 (Allahabad) for the proposition that a valid revised return supersedes the original, which is then treated as withdrawn. The Tribunal added that the proviso restricting the number of choices did not apply in the absence of business income, and that filing Form 10-IEA is procedural. The Surat Bench reached the mirror-image result on 14 July 2026 in Nirbhay Nainish Wadiwala v. ITO, ITA No. 424/SRT/2026, where the taxpayer moved into the then-optional new regime by revised return.

No High Court has ruled on regime-switching in a revised return, and the Board has issued no clarification either way. The practical consequence for a reader is precise: the change will be rejected at intimation stage, and securing it means an appeal to the Commissioner (Appeals) and probably to the Tribunal. Section 5(b) of the Finance Act 2026 substituted Section 139(5) so that a revised return may be furnished until the end of the relevant assessment year or completion of assessment, whichever is earlier, which for the assessment year 2026-27 means 31 March 2027.

What the drawing and disbursing officer is told, and what it does not decide

The intimation to the employer is not the statutory option, and CBDT Circular No. 4/2023 dated 5 April 2023 says so in terms. Paragraph 6 provides that the intimation “would not amount to exercising option in terms of sub-section (6) of section 115BAC of the Act and the person shall be required to do so separately in accordance with the provisions of the sub-section”. The circular supersedes Circular No. C1 of 2020 dated 13 April 2020 and applies, by paragraph 7, to the financial year 2023-24 and subsequent years, so it governs the financial years 2025-26 and 2026-27.

Two practical points follow. An employee deducted under the new regime through the year may still elect the old regime in the return and claim a refund of excess tax deducted, and the reverse leaves a balance to pay. And the circular imposes no bar on varying the intimation during the year: it requires an intimation “for each year” and says nothing about revision, so a mid-year change is a matter for the payroll cycle rather than a statutory restriction.

The annual explanatory circular on salary deduction remains Circular No. 24/2022 dated 7 December 2022 as amended by Circular No. 3/2025 dated 20 February 2025. No fresh circular in that series has issued for the financial year 2025-26 or 2026-27.

Verification, and the date the return is treated as furnished

Late verification can destroy a correctly made regime choice, and this is the least visible failure in the whole procedure. Paragraph 2(i) of Directorate of Systems Notification No. 2 of 2024 dated 31 March 2024 provides that where verification is completed within 30 days of uploading, the date of uploading is the date of furnishing the return. Paragraph 2(ii) provides that where verification comes after 30 days, “the date of e-verification/ITR-V submission shall be treated as the date of furnishing the return of income and all consequences of late filing of return under the Act shall follow”.

The arithmetic is unforgiving. A return uploaded on 28 July 2026 and verified on 3 September 2026 is a return furnished on 3 September 2026. That is past the 31 July 2026 due date, so it is no longer a return under Section 139(1), and the old-regime election under Section 115BAC(6)(ii) fails with it. The earlier instrument fixing the 30-day limit was Notification No. 05 of 2022 dated 29 July 2022, also issued by the Directorate of Systems.

A return never verified is invalid, but the test carries a limb that is easy to miss. The corrigendum of 4 April 2024 substituted paragraph 5 to provide that a return is treated as invalid for non-verification where it is not verified “within 30 days from the date of uploading or till the due date for furnishing the return of income as per the Income-tax Act, 1961”, whichever of those two is later. The “whichever is later” limb was the corrigendum’s addition; the paragraph as first issued set only the 30-day test. Where the ITR-V is posted, the date of its receipt at the Centralised Processing Centre in Bengaluru counts for the 30 days, not the date of posting.

The once-only restriction on business income

A taxpayer with business or professional income has one return ticket, and spending it is irreversible while the business continues. Clause (i) of Section 115BAC(6) provides that the option to opt out, once exercised, applies to subsequent assessment years. The proviso allows it to be withdrawn only once, in a previous year other than the year in which it was exercised, and provides that after withdrawal the person is not eligible to exercise the option again.

The practical shape of this is a single decision taken once and lived with. A government employee who takes up consultancy work, opts out into the old regime through Form 10-IEA, and later withdraws that option to return to the new regime, cannot go back to the old regime for as long as the business or professional income continues. That is a reason to compute carefully before the first opt-out rather than after it.

The Income-tax Act 2025 softens this slightly. Section 202(4)(a)(iv) carries the bar forward but adds an express carve-out: the person is never again eligible to exercise the option “except where such person ceases to have any income from business or profession, and in such a case the option under clause (b) shall be available”. A person who exits business income altogether therefore re-enters the annual freedom that a salaried filer has.

What is gained and lost on switching

Moving to the old regime buys deductions and pays for them in rate. Six items survive in the new regime: the Rs. 75,000 standard deduction on salary and pension, the employer’s National Pension System contribution under Section 80CCD(2) at 14% of basic pay plus dearness allowance, the Central Government’s contribution to the Agniveer Corpus Fund under Section 80CCH(2), the family-pension deduction under Section 57(iia), certain duty-related and disability transport allowances, and interest on a let-out house.

Everything else is old-regime only. Section 80C, Section 80D, Section 80CCD(1B) for the employee’s own National Pension System contribution, the house rent allowance exemption, leave travel concession, interest on a self-occupied house, and the age-based higher basic exemptions of Rs. 3 lakh at 60 and Rs. 5 lakh at 80 all sit on the old side.

One item is neutral and is routinely mishandled. The employer’s Section 80CCD(2) contribution is allowed under both regimes, so it lowers the taxable base equally on each side and should be excluded from any break-even comparison. Counting it as an old-regime advantage overstates that regime’s case by 14% of basic pay plus dearness allowance.

Pensioners and the regime choice

A pensioner switches exactly as a serving employee does, with no form and no lock-in, provided there is no business or professional income. Pension is chargeable as salary, so the Rs. 75,000 standard deduction applies in the new regime, and the pension-paying bank deducts tax under Section 192 on the regime intimated to it, as CBDT Circular No. 761 dated 13 January 1998 confirms.

The old regime rarely helps a pensioner. Its two age-linked advantages, the higher basic exemption and the Section 80TTB deduction of up to Rs. 50,000 on deposit interest, are worth nothing where the new regime already charges nil up to a pension of Rs. 12.75 lakh. The higher exemptions are worth Rs. 2,500 and Rs. 12,500 of tax respectively, against a break-even requirement that runs into lakhs. A pensioner drawing a family pension should note that the Section 57(iia) deduction survives in both regimes and is therefore neutral.

The position from tax year 2026-27 under Rule 136

From the tax year 2026-27 the election moves into the return and Form 10-IEA ceases to exist. The Income-tax Act 2025 came into force on 1 April 2026, and the Income-tax Rules 2026 were notified by Notification No. 22/2026, G.S.R. 198(E), dated 20 March 2026. Rule 136, headed “Exercise or withdrawal of option for new tax regime”, provides that the option under the provisions listed in its Table, which include Section 202(4) for an individual, Hindu undivided family, association of persons, body of individuals or artificial juridical person, “shall be in the return of income to be furnished under section 263(1) for such tax year”.

Three consequences follow for a salaried reader. There is no successor to Form 10-IEA, so the separate filing disappears for business and professional taxpayers too. The due-date linkage is unchanged in substance, running now through Section 263(1), the successor to Section 139(1). And the mechanics for a person without business income are the same as today: an election made in the return, afresh each year.

The timing must not be confused. The Income-tax Act 2025 and the Income-tax Rules 2026 came into force on 1 April 2026 but do not govern the return being filed in the 2026 season. The assessment year 2026-27, being the financial year 2025-26, is assessed under the Income-tax Act 1961, Section 115BAC, Rule 21AGA and Form 10-IEA. The new machinery bites on the tax year 2026-27, whose return is filed in 2027.

Switching back the following year

For a salaried person or pensioner without business income each year stands alone, and there is nothing special about switching back. The comparison is run again on that year’s figures and the answer entered in that year’s return. Movement between the regimes commonly follows life events that change the deduction total: a home loan repaid, a large Section 80C investment matured, a child’s tuition ended, or a move out of rented accommodation that ends the house rent allowance exemption.

Only a taxpayer with business or professional income faces the once-only restriction, and only that taxpayer needs to treat a switch as a decision rather than an annual arithmetic exercise.

Related Articles

• Tax regime break-even: when the old regime wins
• Income tax slabs for AY 2027-28
• Section 115BAC
• Section 202 of the Income-tax Act 2025
• New tax regime
• Old tax regime
• Old versus new tax regime
• Form 10-IEA to opt out of the new regime
• Deductions allowed in the new tax regime
• Standard deduction
• Section 87A rebate
• Marginal relief on income tax
• Surcharge on income tax
• Section 80C
• Section 80TTB
• HRA exemption under Section 10(13A)
• Leave travel concession
• NPS tax benefits
• National Pension System
• TDS on salary
• Form 12BB
• Form 16
• Form 26AS
• ITR-1 (Sahaj)
• Belated return
• Revised return
• Section 119(2)(b) condonation of delay
• Section 234F late filing fee
• Section 44AB tax audit
• Capital gains tax
• Advance tax
• Section 89 relief
• Income-tax Act 2025
• Finance Act 2026
• Income tax for government employees
• Income tax for pensioners
• Senior citizen tax
• Family pension
• Central Board of Direct Taxes
• Central government employees in India
• Take-home salary of central government employees

External references

• Income Tax Department: e-filing portal
• Income Tax Department: downloads and income-tax return forms
• Central Board of Direct Taxes: circulars
• Central Board of Direct Taxes: notifications
• Income-tax Act 1961, Section 115BAC
• Central Board of Direct Taxes
• Department of Revenue, Ministry of Finance
• Income Tax Appellate Tribunal

References

1. Income-tax Act, 1961, Section 115BAC, in particular sub-section (1A) (rates under the default new regime) and sub-section (6) with its proviso (clause (i) for a person having income from business or profession, exercisable on or before the due date under Section 139(1) and applying to subsequent assessment years; clause (ii) for any other person, exercisable along with the return furnished under Section 139(1); withdrawal permitted once only).
2. Income-tax Rules, 1962, Rule 21AGA and Form 10-IEA (exercise and withdrawal of the option to be taxed under the old regime by a person having income from business or profession).
3. Income-tax Act, 1961, Section 139(1), Explanation 2 as substituted by Section 5 of the Finance Act, 2026 (No. 4 of 2026, assented 30 March 2026) with effect from 1 March 2026, and Section 139(5) as substituted by Section 5(b) of that Act.
4. Central Board of Direct Taxes, Circular No. 04 of 2023, F. No. 370142/06/2023-TPL, dated 5 April 2023 (deduction of tax under Section 192 read with Section 115BAC(1A): employer to seek the intended tax regime, default where no intimation is made, and the intimation not amounting to the exercise of the option under Section 115BAC(6)), in supersession of Circular No. C1 of 2020 dated 13 April 2020.
5. Central Board of Direct Taxes, Circular No. 24/2022 dated 7 December 2022 as amended by Circular No. 3/2025, F. No. 275/107/2024-IT(B), dated 20 February 2025 (income-tax deduction from salaries under Section 192).
6. Central Board of Direct Taxes, Notification No. 45/2026, F. No. 370142/5/2026-TPL, G.S.R. 226(E), dated 30 March 2026 (Income-tax (Second Amendment) Rules, 2026, notifying ITR-1 and ITR-4 for the assessment year 2026-27 and substituting “two house properties” for “one house property” in rule 12(1)(a)(ii)), together with Notifications No. 46/2026 to 51/2026 of the same date for ITR-2, ITR-3, ITR-5, ITR-6, ITR-7 and ITR-V.
7. Directorate of Systems, Income Tax Department, Notification No. 2 of 2024 dated 31 March 2024 with its corrigendum dated 4 April 2024 (time limit for verification of the return and the date on which a return is treated as furnished), succeeding Notification No. 05 of 2022 dated 29 July 2022.
8. Income-tax Act, 1961, Section 234F as substituted by the Finance Act, 2021 (Act No. 13 of 2021) with effect from 1 April 2021 (fee of Rs. 5,000, capped at Rs. 1,000 where total income does not exceed Rs. 5 lakh).
9. Manmohan Singh v. Income Tax Officer, Ward 1(2), Dehradun, ITA No. 92/DDN/2026, Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, Delhi Bench, pronounced 3 August 2026; Nirbhay Nainish Wadiwala v. Income Tax Officer 2(2)(1), Surat, ITA No. 424/SRT/2026, Surat Bench, pronounced 14 July 2026; applying Dhampur Sugar Mills Ltd. v. Commissioner of Income Tax [1973] 90 ITR 236 (Allahabad).
10. Income-tax Act, 2025 (Act No. 30 of 2025), in force 1 April 2026, Sections 202(4) and 263(1); Income-tax Rules, 2026, notified by Notification No. 22/2026, F. No. 370142/41/2025-TPL, G.S.R. 198(E), dated 20 March 2026, Rule 136.