Old and new income-tax section numbers

Why the numbers changed

From 1 April 2026 the Income-tax Act, 2025 is the Act in force. It is a renumbering and a restatement. A rule you knew as section 80C did not vanish. It picked up a new number, and in several cases it now sits in a section plus a schedule. FY 2026-27, assessment year 2027-28, is the first year that uses the new numbers on the return.

Older articles, employer circulars, and the notice for a year before FY 2026-27 still say 80C, 87A or 115BAC. This page is the crosswalk for the numbers Finfod’s calculators actually use. It is not a complete concordance of every section in the Act. If a number is not in the table, do not guess a partner for it. Read the section in the Act, or the department’s comparison of the Act and the Bill.

The Finance Bill 2026 memorandum says the slab rates and the First Schedule rates are unchanged for tax year 2026-27. The new numbers did not, by themselves, cut the 30% rate or raise the rebate. Where the substance did change, the guides on slabs, the regime choice, HRA and capital gains say so in words, not only with a new digit.

The lookup

Table: Old number and the Income-tax Act, 2025 number used on Finfod

How a salary return maps

A payslip conversation that used to be “80C, 80D, HRA, standard deduction, 115BAC” is now a short list.

The regime box is section 202, not 115BAC. If you stay in it, you keep the section 202 slabs and the ₹75,000 standard deduction under section 19. You do not keep section 123, section 126, section 124(3), Schedule III item 11, or section 22(1)(b). Employer NPS under section 124(1) and 124(2) stays. The rate is 14% of salary in the new regime. In the old regime a private employer is at 10%, and a government employer stays at 14%.

If you leave section 202, the standard deduction is ₹50,000. Section 123 comes back, with the ₹1.5 lakh cap. Your own NPS inside that cap is Schedule XV, paragraph 1(y), not a second ₹1.5 lakh. The extra ₹50,000 is a different section, 124(3). Health cover is section 126. The calculator’s combined ceiling of ₹1 lakh is a simplification of that section. It does not replace the self, family and parent split in the Act. If your premium needs that split, do not trust the single box past the ceiling.

HRA is not section 10(13A) on a FY 2026-27 return. It is Schedule III, table item 11, and the amount is Rule 279. The HRA guide is the three-way test. The new regime drops the exemption by section 202(2)(a)(i). Professional tax drops by section 202(2)(a)(iv).

The rebate line on the form is section 156. A resident in the new regime looks at ₹12 lakh of total income, not at the old ₹7 lakh memory and not at section 87A’s ₹5 lakh line. The old regime still has the ₹5 lakh line, with a ₹12,500 cap and no marginal relief. Both are section 156 now. The slabs guide shows the arithmetic.

Savings schemes

PPF deposits, when the old regime allows them, are section 123 read with Schedule XV, paragraph 1(e). That was section 80C. The yearly deposit cap in the PPF scheme is still ₹1.5 lakh, and it shares the section 123 room with EPF, ELSS and life insurance. The maturity proceeds are dealt with under Schedule II, which was Section 10(11). The PPF calculator compounds the deposit. It does not file the deduction.

NPS is several sections at once, which is why one “80CCD” memory causes mistakes.

Your own contribution, inside the ₹1.5 lakh cap, is Section 123 read with Schedule XV, paragraph 1(y). That was Section 80CCD(1). For an employee the Act limits this piece to 10% of salary. For someone who is not an employee it is 20% of gross total income. Either way it shares the section 123 cap. It is not an extra ₹1.5 lakh.

The additional ₹50,000 is Section 124(3). That was Section 80CCD(1B). Section 202 drops it, along with section 123.

The employer’s contribution is Section 124. That was Section 80CCD(2). Section 202 keeps this one. On the way out, Schedule II (this was Section 10(12A)) leaves out a lump sum only up to 60% of the corpus. A rule that lets you take a larger cash share does not make the extra part exempt. The pension is taxed when it is paid. The NPS calculator states those limits next to the projection.

Section 153 is the interest deduction that was section 80TTA for a person under 60 and section 80TTB for a senior. Under 60, it is savings-account interest up to ₹10,000, not a fixed deposit. A senior who is not under section 202 can deduct up to ₹50,000 of interest, including a fixed deposit. The FD page explains why it does not subtract section 153 automatically: the rest of the person’s interest, and the regime, are not on that screen.

Capital gains numbers you will still see

A contract note, a CAMS statement, or a 2024 article will say 111A, 112 and 112A. On a sale in FY 2026-27 the same gains are sections 196, 197 and 198. The rates did not flip back. Short-term listed equity is 20%. Long-term listed equity is 12.5% above ₹1.25 lakh. Other long-term gains are generally 12.5%. The holding-period definition is section 2(101), not section 2(42A).

Section 76 is the one that surprises debt-fund holders. Units bought on or after 1 April 2023 do not become long-term at 12.5% after two or three years. They stay at slab. That was section 50AA.

Indexation is no longer the ordinary computation under what used to be section 48. For a sale now, it survives as the section 197(3) choice for land or a building acquired before 23 July 2024. The Cost Inflation Index for FY 2026-27 is 384. The capital gains guide works an example. Gold does not get that choice. The gold guide says which clock applies to coins, ETFs and Sovereign Gold Bonds.

Sections 82 to 88 are the reinvestment group. The capital gains page names them as the old 54 series, including 54, 54EC and 54F. This table does not pretend each old subsection has been checked onto a single new digit beyond that group. If you need 54B or 54G, open the Act. Do not invent the pair from a blog that only says “80C is now 123”.

What did not move just because the number did

A new section number is not a new allowance. Section 202 still switches off the old deductions. The ₹12 lakh rebate is still only for a resident, still before cess, and still not a wipe of special-rate equity tax. The ₹1.5 lakh cap is still one basket. Employer NPS is still a percentage of salary, not a blank cheque.

FY 2025-26 paperwork stays on the old numbers even if you are reading this in the middle of that filing season. Use this table for the year that begins 1 April 2026. The calculators are labelled FY 2026-27 for that reason. Where a page also says the rates match FY 2025-26, it is talking about the rates, not about printing 202 on a return for the earlier year.

If a bank form, a broker note, or a housing-loan certificate still prints 80C or 24(b), the certificate can be right about the fact and old about the label. The income tax calculator and the regime calculator use the new labels next to the boxes. The Excel download on the regime page uses them too.

This crosswalk was checked on 28 October 2026 against the Act text the calculators cite, the Finance Bill 2026 memorandum, and the schedule pages linked above. It will not be updated by renaming a section in an article somewhere else. When the Act itself moves a number, the calculator config and this table should move together.