Does my Indian company need a director who lives in India?
An Indian company is required to have a director who has stayed in India for the qualifying period, so for a foreign-owned company this is usually the first structural question rather than a detail. The requirement is tested against actual stay, which means it is a question of evidence about a person, not a box on a form. The first step is to confirm the requirement as it stands for the current financial year and then to identify someone who genuinely satisfies it and is willing to accept what the office involves.
What is a director identification number and who has to have one?
It is the identifier a person must hold before they can be appointed a director of an Indian company, and it attaches to the individual rather than to any one company. Obtaining it is a step in its own right with its own documents and verification, and it has to be completed before the appointment can be made effective. Plan for it in the sequence. A foreign shareholder who assumes a director can be appointed at a board meeting on a day's notice usually discovers this requirement at the point it delays everything else.
Can I just use a nominee to satisfy the resident director requirement?
The office is not a name lent for a filing. Someone appointed a director owes duties to the company and carries filings and personal responsibilities that no private arrangement between you and them can set aside, so the risk of a casual appointment falls on the individual as much as on the group. It also tends to surface at the worst moment, when a decision has to be defended and nobody can say who took it. If a local appointment is genuinely needed, treat it as a real appointment of a real person, with checks running in both directions before anyone signs.
What should the agreement with a resident director actually cover?
Scope first: what decisions the director takes, what is reserved, and what information they are entitled to receive in order to discharge duties they cannot contract out of. Then the indemnities, which matter because the responsibilities are personal. Then the exit, agreed at the outset rather than negotiated during a dispute, including who files what when the appointment ends. The document is written before the appointment is made, not afterwards. An arrangement that has never addressed how it ends is the one that causes difficulty, and it does so at the worst moment.
Does a resident director change where my company is managed for tax?
It can, and that is the reason the tax side is planned with the appointment rather than after it. Who manages the company and from where feeds into residency positions and into the withholding treatment of payments that follow, so an appointment made purely to satisfy a corporate requirement can move the tax picture without anyone intending it. Work out what the proposed scope of authority means before the agreement is signed. Then document how decisions are actually taken, so the record and the arrangement say the same thing.
What filings follow once a resident director has been appointed?
The appointment is only effective once the registrations and filings that give it effect have been completed, so the board resolution is the start of the process rather than the end of it. The person must hold their identification number first, their consent and disclosures have to be in place, and the appointment is then notified through the registry. Each step has its own document. The practical advice is to treat the appointment as a sequence with a completion date, and to confirm that every filing has actually gone through before relying on the director being in office.
How many days can I spend in a country before I become tax resident?
It depends on the country, and a day count is only ever the start. Many use a threshold in a tax year, some also look at averages across several years, and some have no day test at all and decide on where your home and life are. Two countries can both conclude you are resident, which is what the treaty tie-breaker exists to settle. Counting days without checking the tie-breaker is how people end up filing as resident nowhere. See the residency tie-breaker.
How do I get a refund of TCS collected on a foreign remittance?
You claim it on your Indian return for that year. The collected amount is credited against your total tax, and if it exceeds the tax due the balance is refunded like any excess payment. Two practical conditions: the collector must have filed its statement so the credit appears in your annual tax statement, and your PAN must be correctly recorded on the remittance. A salaried remitter can also ask their employer to account for it against salary withholding. See LRS limits and TCS.
