Expanding into India and stuck on PAN or DSC paperwork?

India is increasingly the "next China" for Korean manufacturers and exporters, but every step of doing business there online — company incorporation, tax filing, GST returns, government e-tendering — requires a DSC (Digital Signature Certificate) under India's IT Act, and every company or individual transacting with an Indian counterparty needs a PAN (Permanent Account Number), India's tax-identification card. Both are foreign, unfamiliar filing systems for a Korean office, and since April 1, 2026 the rules for foreign entities changed substantially.

What changed on April 1, 2026

1. A dedicated foreign-entity form — foreign companies now file Form 96 instead of the Form 49AA used previously.
2. A mandatory local representative — every foreign applicant must now name a Representative Assessee or Authorized Representative resident in India, and provide that person's PAN and Aadhaar numbers. A Korean company with no India presence still needs to secure a local tax consultant or similar representative for this role.
3. A mandatory home-country tax ID — foreign entities must now list their home tax identification number; for a Korean company, that's the business registration number on the English-language business registration certificate.

Filing Form 96 online and paying the fee doesn't finish the process — the physical acknowledgment and supporting documents must reach India's issuing authority (Protean) by international courier within 15 days, and the Representative Assessee (not the Korean CEO) is the one who signs the physical application.

Required documents

• Power of attorney appointing the India-based representative
• English-language business registration certificate and corporate registry — apostilled, or consular-authenticated at the Indian embassy in Korea, since Indian authorities won't accept these as valid foreign public documents otherwise
• Applicant identification (passport, valid 6+ months) and proof of address for individual applicants

DSC — the "digital seal" for India

A DSC is required for company incorporation and director registration (DIN), income-tax and GST filings, and participation in government e-tendering — think of it as India's equivalent of a Korean corporate seal, but in cryptographic form on a USB security token.

1. Send apostilled/notarized ID and address documents as PDFs
2. Online application and document upload to the Indian certifying authority's (CA) system
3. A video identity-verification interview, conducted in English (we provide the script)
4. USB token issuance and delivery to Korea — roughly 2–3 weeks

Common questions after the company's PAN is already issued

A change in representative director, or a passport renewal, does not require re-issuing the company's PAN — it's a permanent number tied to the legal entity, not the officer. A DSC that has expired, however, cannot be "renewed" — it must be filed as a brand-new application.

Form 41 — claiming a reduced withholding-tax rate on payments from India

If an Indian counterparty asks a Korean company or freelancer to "send Form 41," they're asking for the self-declaration Indian tax authorities require to apply a reduced treaty withholding rate — Form 41 replaced the older Form 10F entirely. Any Korean company or individual receiving royalties, consulting fees, or service payments from an Indian payer faces a default withholding rate of 20%+ under Indian tax law; the Korea-India Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement (DTAA) lowers that, but only once the recipient proves Korean tax residency to India's tax authority through Form 41, filed online alongside a Tax Residency Certificate (TRC), tax ID (TIN), and — depending on the service type — a No-PE declaration.

We filed our first Form 41 case within a week of opening this office, for a Korean company supplying software to an Indian client: with all three documents (Form 41, TRC, No-PE Form) in place, the withholding rate for software-as-service payments drops to 10% — versus 20% with only the No-PE Form and TRC, or up to 43.7% with none of them. A mismatch between the TRC and the information entered on India's portal is the single most common cause of an instant rejection.

Individual freelancers qualify too — a Korean consultant billing an Indian client directly can file Form 41 as an "Individual" taxpayer using their English name, date of birth, and resident registration number in place of a corporate TIN, and claim the same treaty benefit. An Indian PAN card is no longer required to file — since a system update, Korean filers without one can submit under "non-resident without PAN" status.

Why use a Korea-based agent for an India filing

The paperwork chain — apostille, English translation, appointing a trustworthy India-side representative, matching the physical courier deadline — has several places a single missing step causes a rejection and a full restart. We handle the apostille and translation from the Korean side and coordinate directly with the India-side CA and representative, so a Seoul-based company doesn't have to manage two country's bureaucracies at once.