As the price of the yellow metal has corrected, physical gold buying activity has picked up. As per a report from Bloomberg, gold imports in March touched the highest monthly total in almost two years. If you are planning to buy gold, apart from the making charges, you should keep the taxes in mind.
In case you are buying physical gold, you also need to pay goods and services tax (GST).
On gold jewellery, a GST of 3% is levied. The GST is charged on the total value of gold purchased as well as the making charges. For example, if you are buying a gold ornament at the price of ₹45,000 per 10 gm and the making charges are at the rate of 10%, then the total cost after making charges will be ₹45,000 plus 10% of ₹45,000 = ₹49,500. GST at the rate of 3% on the ₹49,500 will be levied, taking the total cost of purchase to ₹50,985.
In case you are getting an old gold ornament redesigned, GST at the rate of 18% will be levied on the making charges as here you are providing your own gold.
GST is not only levied in case of buying physical gold, but also in the case of digital gold.
So, in case you are buying digital gold, apart from the other charges, you also need to pay GST at the rate of 3% as the digital gold provider buys physical gold in your name equivalent to the amount invested.
The same is the case with gold exchange-traded funds (ETFs) offered by mutual funds. They also back the investments with physical gold. However, in case of gold ETFs, the GST is paid back to investors as the fund house takes input credit for the same.
Meanwhile, in case of sovereign gold bonds, as there is no physical gold buying involved, no GST is levied.
Source: https://www.livemint.com/money/personal-finance/decoding-gst-levied-on-gold-purchases-11618335498202.html
The goods and services tax is charged on the total value of gold purchased as well as the making charges