FLA Return Due Date Extended to 31 July 2026 (FY 2025-26)

Update, July 2026: RBI has extended the FLA return due date for FY 2025-26 from 15 July 2026 to 31 July 2026. The extension was communicated through the FLAIR portal, where a notice confirms the revised timeline. If your entity has not filed yet, you now have until 31 July 2026, and this page walks you through exactly what to do with the time.

Every Indian company and LLP that has received foreign direct investment or made overseas investment must file the annual return on Foreign Liabilities and Assets, and this year the deadline moved. Here is the confirmation, who must file, the portal steps, and the late fee exposure if 31 July also slips past you.

RBI Extends FLA Due Date to 31 July 2026: Official Confirmation

The FLA return ordinarily falls due on 15 July each year. For FY 2025-26, RBI extended the window to 31 July 2026, giving late starters an extra two weeks. Treat 31 July as hard: extensions are granted some years and not others, and filing against unaudited figures is expressly permitted, so waiting for audited accounts is not a reason to miss it. If audited numbers later differ, you file a revised return.

Who Must File the FLA Return

Any Indian company that has received FDI in any past year and still has foreign assets or liabilities outstanding on its balance sheet must file, even if no fresh investment came in during FY 2025-26. The same applies to LLPs with foreign capital contribution and to entities that have made overseas direct investment. A subsidiary that received its share capital from a foreign parent years ago and has had no transactions since still files every July. If your entity received FDI during the year, the FLA return sits alongside the FC-GPR filing you made at allotment, and both feed the same RBI picture of your FEMA compliance position.

What to Do Before 31 July

1. Confirm your entity is registered on the FLAIR portal, the RBI's dedicated FLA system. First time filers need to create the entity user first, and approval of new registrations can take a working day or two, so do not leave this for 30 July.
2. Pull the FY 2025-26 balance sheet, audited or provisional, plus the detail of foreign shareholding, any parent loans, and overseas assets.
3. Complete the return on FLAIR: entity profile, foreign liabilities (equity and debt owed to non residents), foreign assets, and the year's movements.
4. Validate and submit, then save the acknowledgement. If audited accounts later change the numbers, file the revised return.

What Happens if You Miss 31 July

A missed FLA return is a FEMA contravention. The Late Submission Fee framework applies to delayed filings, with ₹7,500 as the standard base amount for most late FEMA returns, and older or repeated lapses can require a formal compounding application to RBI, a slower and more expensive route we cover in our FEMA compounding guide. Non filing also surfaces at the worst moments: banks check FEMA standing during remittances, and acquirers check it during due diligence. Fifteen minutes on FLAIR before 31 July is cheaper than any of those conversations.

The FLA Return in Context: the Annual FEMA Rhythm

The FLA return is one leg of the recurring FEMA calendar for a foreign owned entity: FC-GPR within 30 days of any share allotment to a foreign investor, FC-TRS on share transfers between residents and non residents, and the FLA each July. Entities that set up recently can see the full sequence in our foreign subsidiary registration guide, which maps every filing from incorporation onward. If the calendar keeps slipping internally, that is usually the signal to move the FEMA layer onto a managed compliance retainer rather than chasing each deadline ad hoc.