Repatriating Money from India: Forms 145/146, NRO/NRE Limits and the USD 1 Million Scheme

The money is yours. Getting it out of India is still a process — account rules, an annual ceiling, and a set of certificates your bank will not remit without. From 1 April 2026 those certificates carry new names: Form 145 (earlier 15CA) and Form 146 (earlier 15CB). Here is the whole repatriation picture in one place.

NRO vs NRE: where your money sits decides how it moves

Everything starts with which account holds the funds.

NRE (and FCNR) accounts hold money you brought into India from abroad, plus its interest. These balances are freely repatriable — no annual ceiling, minimal paperwork. If funds are already in NRE, repatriation is largely a banking exercise.

NRO accounts hold your India-sourced money: rent, dividends, interest, pension, sale proceeds of property and investments, inheritances and gifts received in India. NRO funds are repatriable, but within a ceiling and against documentation. This is where the USD 1 million scheme and the Form 145/146 machinery live — and where almost every NRI repatriation question really begins.

The USD 1 million per year scheme

NRIs and OCIs may remit up to USD 1 million per financial year (April to March) out of NRO balances. The scheme covers the classic "stuck in India" assets: property-sale proceeds, inherited money, matured deposits and investments, balances accumulated over years.

Points worth knowing before you plan around it:

• The limit is per person, per financial year. A larger amount can be moved across two or more financial years — a March/April split is a legitimate and common plan.
• Current income rides on top. Remittances of current income — rent, dividend, interest, pension — are permitted in addition to the USD 1 million ceiling.
• The bank is the gatekeeper. Remittances go through an Authorised Dealer (AD) bank, which must satisfy itself on the source of funds and the tax position before it remits. The forms below are how you satisfy it.
• Tax first, remittance second. The scheme moves post-tax money. If the underlying income has not borne TDS or tax — say, capital gains on a property sale — settle that before asking the bank to remit.

What moves without touching the ceiling

Before planning around the USD 1 million limit, check whether you need it at all. Two categories sit outside it:

• NRE and FCNR balances. Money that came in from abroad, and its interest, goes back out freely. If you have been crediting foreign earnings to an NRO account out of habit, that is a structural mistake worth fixing — route foreign money through NRE and it never needs the scheme.
• Current income. Rent, dividends, interest and pension arising in India are remittable in addition to the ceiling, against evidence that tax has been deducted or paid. An NRI with ₹18 lakh of annual rent does not consume any of the USD 1 million by remitting it.

The ceiling is really for capital — sale proceeds, inheritances, accumulated balances. Frame your remittance plan that way and the limit goes much further.

The certificates: Form 145 and Form 146 (earlier 15CA/15CB)

Under the Income-tax Act, 2025, the familiar remittance forms were renumbered from 1 April 2026. The substance is unchanged; the names are new.

Form 145 (earlier Form 15CA)

The remitter's own declaration, filed online on the income-tax portal. It tells the department what is being remitted, to whom, and the tax treatment claimed. Most remittances need this form; the specified exempt list of personal remittances (the old Rule 37BB-type list) continues, and items on it do not.

Form 146 (earlier Form 15CB)

A chartered accountant's certificate. It is required where taxable remittances to a non-resident exceed ₹5 lakh in the financial year. The CA examines the source of funds, the computation of income, the TDS or tax paid, and any treaty relief claimed, and certifies the position. Banks will not process a sizeable NRO remittance without it. Below the ₹5 lakh threshold, the self-declaration alone is enough — a simplification many older articles still miss.

Transition note: forms 15CA and 15CB filed for remittances completed on or before 31 March 2026 remain valid. Only new remittances from 1 April 2026 use the new numbers.

If treaty relief affects the tax on what you are remitting — for instance, a lower dividend rate — the certificate will lean on your Tax Residency Certificate and Form 42 (earlier 10F). We cover that in DTAA for NRIs: how to actually claim it.

Step by step: remitting property-sale proceeds

The most common large remittance we handle is a property sale. The sequence:

1. Close the tax position on the sale

The buyer should have deducted TDS and filed Form 27Q; ideally you sold against a lower-TDS certificate so the deduction matched your real liability. The background is in our guides to TDS on sale of property by an NRI and the lower / NIL TDS certificate.

2. Land the proceeds in NRO

Sale proceeds are credited to your NRO account. Keep the sale deed, the TDS certificate and the gains computation together — the bank and the CA will both want them.

3. Obtain Form 146

For a remittance of this size the CA certificate is required. The CA verifies the source, the capital-gains computation and the tax paid, then issues Form 146.

4. File Form 145

You (or your CA, with authorisation) file Form 145 on the portal, referencing the Form 146 certificate.

5. The bank remits

Submit the forms with the bank's own documentation pack. The bank verifies, counts the amount against your USD 1 million ceiling for the financial year, and remits to your overseas account.

The remittances that stall are almost never blocked by the rules — they stall because the source-of-funds paper trail was never assembled. Build the file first; the transfer then takes days.

Planning a large repatriation

Three planning levers come up in almost every sizeable file:

• Split across financial years. The ceiling resets every 1 April. A ₹12–15 crore estate or sale can move out over two or three years with remittances timed in March and April — entirely within the scheme, no approvals needed.
• NRO to NRE as a staging step. Once funds clear the Form 145/146 process into NRE, they are freely repatriable thereafter. Families who expect to remit in stages often move the money to NRE in year one and wire abroad on their own schedule.
• Sequence tax before transfer. Where the source is a property sale, the lower-TDS certificate, the gains computation and the remittance file share the same documents. Built together, the certificate work pays for itself twice — once in cash flow at the sale, again in a faster Form 146.

A worked sequence: an OCI in London sells an inherited Secunderabad flat for ₹2.4 crore in May. TDS is handled against a lower-deduction certificate; proceeds credit to NRO in June. The CA issues Form 146 covering the gain and tax paid, Form 145 is filed, and the bank remits roughly USD 280,000 in July — well inside the year's USD 1 million headroom, leaving room for further remittances in the same year.

Where NRIs trip up

• Treating the ceiling as per-account. It is per person per financial year, across all your NRO accounts.
• Remitting before tax is settled. The bank will ask how the income was taxed. "I'll sort it at return time" does not move money.
• Thin inheritance paperwork. For inherited funds, banks want the legal chain — will, succession certificate or legal-heir documents. See selling inherited property in India as an NRI for that chain end to end.
• Quoting the old form names after April 2026. Harmless in conversation, confusing in filings. New remittances are Form 145/146.

S. K. Lahoti Associates issues Form 146 certificates, files Form 145, and manages the bank documentation for NRO repatriations — described under our NRI services. If you are planning a remittance, you can contact the firm here.