NSDL COO Prashant Vagal for tax-free bonds to boost retail participation

The Reserve Bank of India recently introduced systematic investment plans (SIPs) facility for Treasury Bills in RBI Retail-Direct platform.

Issuing tax-free bonds could help boost retail participation in the bond market, said Prashant Vagal, chief operating officer (COO) of National Securities Depository Limited (NSDL), on Tuesday. The government has not issued any new tax-free bonds since 2016.

 

“India has seen national savings schemes, small savings schemes, ELSS of mutual funds, pension schemes. There used to be tax saving bonds, people used to jump into that. So, why not we have something like tax saving scheme, where tax saving bonds offer an interest to be non-taxable but the investment is not… we can see the jump happening at the beginning