What the RNOR window means for a returning NRI
Moving back to India doesn't switch your tax status from NRI to full resident overnight. Section 6(6) of the Income Tax Act carves out an intermediate status — RNOR (Resident but Not Ordinarily Resident) — that behaves like NRI status for one crucial purpose: your foreign income generally stays outside Indian tax. Once that window closes and you become ROR (Resident Ordinarily Resident), India taxes your worldwide income — foreign salary, overseas rental income, gains on investments held abroad, all of it. Knowing exactly which FYs you're RNOR in is the difference between realizing a foreign capital gain tax-free and paying Indian tax on it.
The two conditions that keep you RNOR
After you're resident in India for a FY (day count above 182, or the 60+365 test — see the residential status calculator), Section 6(6) asks whether either of these still holds:
- 9-of-10 years: you were non-resident in 9 or more of the 10 financial years immediately preceding the FY in question.
- 729-day rule: your total stay in India across the 7 financial years immediately preceding was 729 days or less.
If either holds, you're RNOR for that year. Once both fail, you're ROR. Both windows roll forward one year at a time — every FY that passes, the oldest year drops out of the lookback and a newer year (now spent living in India) enters it, which is why the RNOR window is finite and why someone who was abroad for a long time gets a longer window than someone who was only abroad briefly.
How this calculator simulates it
Tell it how many consecutive years you were abroad with essentially no days in India, and how many days you were in India during the FY you actually return. From there it assumes you stay in India the full year in every FY after that — a clean, permanent return, not a back-and-forth pattern — and walks the 9-of-10 and 729-day conditions forward year by year using the same constants as the residential status calculator, so the two tools stay consistent with each other.
Worked example
Arjun was NRI for 10 straight years and returns to India in FY 2026-27, spending 200 days in India that year (well past the 182-day threshold, so he's resident from day one). All 10 of the preceding FYs were NRI years, so the 9-of-10 condition is comfortably met — he's RNOR for FY 2026-27. It holds for FY 2027-28 and FY 2028-29 too, since even then at least 9 of the trailing 10 years are still NRI years. By FY 2029-30, only 7 of the trailing 10 years are NRI and his 7-year lookback is stuffed with resident days — both conditions fail, and he becomes ROR. His RNOR window: 3 years.
Contrast that with someone who was abroad for only 2 years: their 7-year lookback still carries 5 fully-resident years even in the return FY, so the 729-day condition fails immediately and they get essentially no RNOR window — they're ROR from the year they return.
Using the window well
The RNOR window is often the best time to realize foreign capital gains, close out or restructure overseas investments, or plan ESOP/RSU vesting from a foreign employer — income that would otherwise fall into Indian tax once you're ROR. It doesn't affect Indian-source income, which is taxable in every status; for that, see the NRI income tax calculator. Since your actual travel pattern may be more irregular than the "clean permanent return" this tool assumes, treat the output as a planning estimate and confirm exact years with a CA before making irreversible decisions.