Supreme Court of India lifts ban on trading in Cryptocurrency

Article authored by Shipra Walia, W S &
Associates LLP.

RBI on 6 April
2018 issued circular that barred the RBI regulated entities to provide any
services in relation to virtual currencies or any transaction related to the buying
or selling of virtual currencies.

The Supreme
Court on Wednesday revoked the ban of cryptocurrency imposed by the Reserve
Bank of India (RBI) in 2018.

This will result in trading in virtual currency
or crypto currency in India. The concept of bitcoins being quite new to the
Indian market, apparently the government has not yet brought taxability of
bitcoins into the statute books. At the same time, the levy of tax on bitcoins
cannot be ruled out because the Indian income tax laws have always sought to
tax income received irrespective of the form in which it is received.