The claim shows up in every NRI forum: "India caps you at one million dollars a year — that's the law." It is stated as though it were a single universal ceiling applying to everything an NRI owns in India. It is not. The USD 1 million limit is a capital account limit that applies to one specific category of funds, and a very large share of what NRIs actually remit is not subject to it at all. Knowing which side of the current-account / capital-account line your money sits on is the difference between a remittance that clears in three days and one that gets returned by your bank's FEMA desk.

What the law actually says

Repatriation from India is governed by two separate rulebooks that operate simultaneously, and conflating them is the root of the confusion.

The FEMA rulebook decides whether you may send the money. Section 5 of the Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999 makes all current account transactions freely permissible, subject only to the reasonable restrictions in the Foreign Exchange Management (Current Account Transactions) Rules, 2000. Section 6 governs capital account transactions, which are permissible only to the extent the RBI expressly allows. The USD 1 million ceiling lives here, in the Foreign Exchange Management (Remittance of Assets) Regulations, 2016 — it is a capital account permission, not an overall cap on your outward flow.

The tax rulebook decides how much of it you may send. This is where the Income-tax Act, 2025 applies. Before an authorised dealer bank will execute the remittance, it must have the reporting forms. Under ITA 2025, Form 15CA is now Form 145 and Form 15CB is now Form 146. Your TDS credit statement, historically Form 26AS, is now Form 168. The substance of the certification did not change on 1 April 2026 — the form numbers did, and banks that had not updated their internal checklists were rejecting correctly-filed submissions through the first quarter. If your bank asks you for "15CB", they mean Form 146.

Note also that ITA 2025 abolished the "Previous Year / Assessment Year" pairing. There is now a single Tax Year. Your remittance for the year running 1 April 2026 to 31 March 2027 falls in Tax Year 2026-27, and your Form 146 will say so.

The line that actually matters

Current account remittances — no USD 1 million limit applies.

These are your income streams, not your asset base. Rental income from Indian property, interest credited on NRO deposits, dividends from Indian shares, pension, family maintenance to dependants, and professional or consultancy fees earned in India. These are freely remittable under FEMA Section 5 in any amount, provided the tax has been paid or deducted and Form 145 / Form 146 are filed. An NRI drawing ₹4 crore a year in rent from a Mumbai commercial property can remit all of it. There is no annual cap on that flow.

Capital account remittances — the USD 1 million per financial year limit applies.

These are conversions of your Indian asset base into foreign currency. Proceeds from the sale of immovable property, the corpus of inherited assets, balances in an NRO account representing accumulated legacy funds, proceeds of assets acquired under a settlement or will, and redemption of certain investments. The limit is USD 1 million per financial year, per person, per PAN — not per bank, not per account, not per property.

NRE and FCNR balances — fully and freely repatriable, with no limit at all.

Both principal and interest. Because these accounts are funded from foreign-sourced money that was already repatriable, the RBI does not treat outward movement as a capital account event needing permission. In most cases Form 145 and Form 146 are not required for a remittance out of a pure NRE balance, though banks routinely ask for a self-declaration confirming the source.

Practical implications for NRIs

Scenario 1 — the flat sale that "breached the cap". An NRI in Singapore sells a Bengaluru apartment for ₹3.2 crore. The buyer deducts TDS under Section 195. Net proceeds land in the NRO account, roughly USD 375,000 at prevailing rates. This is a capital account transaction and it consumes about 37% of the USD 1 million headroom for that financial year. Selling two such properties in one year is fine. Selling four is not — the fourth remittance will be held back and must wait for 1 April, or go through an RBI application.

Scenario 2 — rent misclassified as capital. The same NRI also draws ₹18 lakh a year in rent, credited to the same NRO account. This is a current account receipt and should not count against the USD 1 million. But once it is commingled in a single NRO account with sale proceeds, the bank cannot distinguish the two, and many banks default to treating the whole outflow as capital account. The practical fix is banal and effective: maintain separate NRO accounts — one for recurring income, one for capital receipts. The paperwork trail then does the arguing for you.

Scenario 3 — the "per PAN" trap. Spouses each have their own USD 1 million entitlement. A jointly-held property sold for USD 1.6 million, with proceeds split correctly between two PANs, moves out in one year. Routed entirely through one spouse's PAN, it does not.

Scenario 4 — the inherited estate. Assets inherited from a resident Indian are repatriable up to USD 1 million per financial year, and the bank will want the will or succession certificate, the legal heir certificate, and Form 146 certifying that estate duty and income tax obligations are settled. There is no separate higher limit for inheritance, contrary to a persistent forum myth.

The TCS point that gets missed. Tax Collected at Source under Section 206C(1G) applies to remittances under the Liberalised Remittance Scheme — which is a resident facility. An NRI repatriating from an NRO account is not remitting under LRS and TCS does not apply. Banks occasionally levy it in error. If it appears on your advice, check Form 168 (formerly Form 26AS), and claim it as a credit in your return.

Step-by-step: what to do

Classify the money before you touch it. Write down the source of each rupee — rent, interest, dividend, sale proceeds, inheritance. Current account items are unlimited; capital account items draw on the USD 1 million.
Segregate the accounts. Keep at least two NRO accounts: recurring income in one, capital receipts in the other. Ask your bank to record the account purpose in its system. This single step prevents most FEMA desk rejections.
Confirm the tax position for each item. Rental income needs tax paid on the net figure after the 30% standard deduction and municipal taxes. Property sale needs capital gains computed after indexation where available, with Section 195 TDS reconciled against your actual liability — the buyer's deduction is frequently far higher than the tax you actually owe.
Obtain Form 146 from a Chartered Accountant. The CA certifies the nature of the remittance, the applicable rate under domestic law or the treaty, and the tax deducted. Bring the sale deed or lease agreement, the TDS certificate, Form 168, the PAN, and proof of your NRI status.
File Form 145 online on the e-filing portal before the remittance, quoting the Form 146 acknowledgement number. Part C is the one that requires the CA certificate; smaller remittances may fall in Part A or the exempt list.
Submit Form A2 to your authorised dealer bank with the FEMA declaration on the nature of the transaction. This is where you state, explicitly, whether it is a current or capital account remittance. State it correctly — the declaration is what the bank's compliance review reads first.
Track your USD 1 million consumption across all banks. Nobody does this for you. Maintain a running sheet by financial year, listing date, amount in USD, and category. When you approach the ceiling, plan the balance for the next 1 April or prepare an RBI application well ahead of the need.
If you exceed the limit inadvertently, do not repeat the remittance. Approach the RBI through your authorised dealer for compounding under Section 13 of FEMA. Voluntary disclosure attracts substantially lighter treatment than a detected contravention.

FAQ

Does the USD 1 million limit reset on 1 January or 1 April?
1 April. It runs by Indian financial year, now called the Tax Year under ITA 2025, not by calendar year. A remittance on 28 March and another on 3 April fall in different years and each draws on a separate USD 1 million entitlement.

Can I remit rental income above USD 1 million in a single year?
Yes. Rental income is a current account transaction under FEMA Section 5 and carries no ceiling. You need the tax paid, Form 146 certification, and Form 145 filed — but the amount itself is not capped. Keep it in a separate NRO account so the bank can see it is income, not corpus.

My bank says I need Form 15CB. Is that still the right form?
It is the right certificate under its new name. Form 15CB became Form 146 under ITA 2025 with effect from 1 April 2026, and Form 15CA became Form 145. The content and the CA's certification obligation are unchanged. If your bank's checklist still says 15CB, submit Form 146 and reference the change — this has been a common friction point through Tax Year 2026-27.

If I have three NRO accounts at three different banks, do I get three separate limits?
No. The USD 1 million ceiling is per person per PAN per financial year, aggregated across every bank and every account. Banks report remittances against your PAN, so the aggregation happens whether or not you track it. Splitting across institutions creates a reporting problem for you, not additional headroom.

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Repatriation goes wrong far more often through misclassification than through genuinely exceeding a limit. Get the current-versus-capital call right, segregate the accounts, and the USD 1 million ceiling stops being the constraint most NRIs assume it is.

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