The Form 10B due date for AY 2026-27 is 30 September 2026. For most charitable and religious trusts, NGOs and institutions, that date lands a full month before the income-tax return — and it carries far more weight than its quiet, technical name suggests. The audit report in Form 10B or Form 10BB is not a supporting schedule you attach later; furnishing it on time is one of the conditions the law attaches to the exemption itself. Clear it late, or file the version of the form that does not apply to you, and the tax office can treat the report as not furnished at all — and with it, the exemption your trust relies on.
What the Form 10B due date for AY 2026-27 actually protects
A registered trust or institution does not pay income tax on the income it applies to its charitable or religious purposes — that is the exemption under sections 11 and 12, and, for approved educational and medical institutions and funds, under section 10(23C). But the exemption is conditional. Where the total income of the trust, computed before giving effect to the exemption, exceeds the maximum amount not chargeable to tax, its accounts must be audited and the audit report furnished electronically in the prescribed form by the specified date. The income-tax department is explicit that this is not a formality: not furnishing the report in the prescribed form, in its own words, “would result in denial of exemption as it is one of the conditions which is required to be satisfied for claim of exemption.” The 30 September date, in other words, is not really about the report — it is about keeping a whole year’s income exempt.
Form 10B or Form 10BB — filing the wrong one costs the same as filing none
Since AY 2023-24 there are two audit-report forms, and which one your trust must file is fixed by the facts of the year, not by preference. You file Form 10B if any one of three things is true during the previous year: the total income of the trust, without giving effect to the exemption, exceeds ₹5 crore; or the trust has received any foreign contribution; or the trust has applied any part of its income outside India. If none of those applies, the smaller-trust form, Form 10BB, is the correct one. The distinction matters because the department has said that filing the wrong form “will amount to non-furnishing of audit report in the prescribed form” — the same consequence as not filing at all. A trust that received even a modest foreign grant, or that spent on a project abroad, is on Form 10B regardless of how small it is, and a well-meaning filing on Form 10BB would not save the exemption. Establish the form first; it cannot be corrected after the report is furnished.
How the 30 September date is fixed — and whether it will move
The date is not arbitrary. A trust whose accounts are audited files its income-tax return (ITR-7) by 31 October 2026, and the audit report is due one month before that return — which is 30 September 2026, a Wednesday. That one-month-before rule is the same one that sets the 30 September date for a business tax audit, and the income-tax portal states the pairing directly. Because AY 2026-27 assesses income earned in FY 2025-26 — before 1 April 2026 — the return is governed by the settled Income-tax Act, 1961, so these are the established dates, not the renumbered provisions taking effect for later years. As for an extension: in some earlier years the CBDT did push the September deadline, and this year several professional bodies have again asked it to move Form 10B/10BB and the tax audit report to 31 October. As of mid-September 2026, nothing has been notified — the date stands at 30 September. Treat any extension as relief that may never come: plan to the statutory date, and check the portal on the day you file.
Which trusts and institutions this actually reaches
The audit requirement is not about how much a trust spends or how many people it employs; it is about income. Any trust or institution registered under section 12A/12AB, and any fund or educational or medical institution approved under section 10(23C), is drawn in once its total income — measured before the exemption is applied — crosses the maximum amount not chargeable to tax. That threshold is low enough that a great many active NGOs clear it in a normal year through grants, donations and programme income. The practical error is not usually ignorance of the audit; it is assuming the trust is “too small” to be caught, or that a foreign grant received once does not change which form applies. Both assumptions are how an exemption gets quietly lost.
The September checklist for a trust or NGO
The trusts that find the last week of September calm are the ones that did the work in the first. Confirm whether your accounts require audit at all — the trigger is total income before exemption above the basic limit, not turnover. Establish which form applies by testing the three Form 10B conditions — the ₹5 crore income line, any foreign contribution, and any application of income outside India — because that decision cannot be undone once the report is filed. Give your auditor the accounts, the registration details (12A/12AB or the 10(23C) approval) and the record of how income was applied, early enough that the report can be furnished and accepted on the portal by 30 September. And keep the return in view: the audit report is the gate, but the income-tax return (ITR-7) still has to follow by 31 October. The report protects the exemption; the return claims it.
None of this is about penalties in the first instance — it is about the exemption. A late fee or interest is recoverable; a denied exemption turns a year of a trust’s income into taxable income, and that is a far larger, and largely avoidable, cost. The 30 September deadline is quiet precisely because it is a condition rather than a headline — which is exactly why it is the one worth managing.