Inside GIFT City: The IFSCA Regulatory Regime

GIFT City has one regulator, the IFSCA, and that is the key to its regulatory framework. Created by the IFSCA Act 2019 and operational since 2020, the IFSCA exercises, within the IFSC, the powers the RBI, SEBI, IRDAI and the pension regulator hold onshore – so a single authority licenses banking, fund management, capital markets, insurance, finance and leasing, payments and more. But there is no single “GIFT licence.” The IFSCA administers a set of activity-specific rulebooks, and which one governs – and what it authorises – depends entirely on the activity. This page maps the regime as a matter of law: the IFSCA’s mandate, the principal rulebooks, how an entity becomes an authorised IFSC unit through the Single Window IT System, and where the IFSCA’s remit ends and FEMA’s begins. It is general legal information, not advice; the IFSCA amends its regulations frequently, so verify at the time of use.

The regime at a glance

• Regulator: IFSCA (IFSCA Act 2019; operational 27 April 2020) – unified, single-window
• Mandate: Exercises, within the IFSC, the powers of the RBI, SEBI, IRDAI and the pension regulator
• Structure: One regulator, many activity-specific rulebooks – not a single licence
• Authorisation: Registration / authorisation as an IFSC unit, via the Single Window IT System (mandatory since October 2024)
• Boundary: The IFSCA regulates activity inside the IFSC; FEMA governs money crossing the boundary
• Scope: The regulatory framework as law – not which licence or vehicle to choose, or setup cost

1. The IFSCA: one unified regulator for GIFT IFSC

The defining feature of GIFT’s regulation is consolidation. Onshore, a financial business answers to several regulators – the Reserve Bank of India for banking, SEBI for securities, the IRDAI for insurance, the pension regulator for pensions. In the IFSC, a single authority does all of this: the International Financial Services Centres Authority, created by the IFSCA Act 2019 and operational since 27 April 2020. The IFSC itself rests on section 18 of the Special Economic Zones Act 2005.

Within the IFSC, the IFSCA exercises the powers that the RBI, SEBI, IRDAI and the pension regulator hold under their own statutes, so far as they relate to financial products, financial services and financial institutions in an IFSC. The result is a genuine single-window regulator – a deliberate design choice meant to make GIFT navigable for cross-sector financial businesses. For the legal adviser, the consequence is that one body, and one body of regulations, governs the activity; the task is to identify which of its rulebooks applies.

2. One regulator, many rulebooks: how the regime is organised

The most common misconception about GIFT is that there is a single “GIFT City licence.” There is not. The IFSCA administers a set of activity-specific rulebooks, each with its own eligibility, capital, conduct and reporting requirements, and an entity is authorised under the rulebook for the activity it intends to carry on. A bank, a fund manager, a stockbroker, an insurer and an aircraft-leasing company in GIFT are governed by entirely different regulations and authorised by entirely different processes – even though they share one regulator.

That framing matters legally because it determines the analysis: the first question for any GIFT proposal is “which regulated activity is this, and which rulebook governs it?” The table later in this page maps the principal activities to their rulebooks. The sections immediately below take the main ones in turn. The IFSCA has issued or amended a striking number of these instruments across 2024–2026 – the signature of a regime steadily maturing and widening its perimeter rather than one in flux – so each rulebook named here is dated, and its current version should be confirmed before it is relied upon.

3. Banking in the IFSC: IFSC Banking Units

Banking in GIFT is governed by the IFSCA (Banking) Regulations 2020. The principal vehicle is the IFSC Banking Unit (IBU) – typically a branch of an existing parent bank (Indian or foreign), backed by capital committed by that parent – through which the bank conducts foreign-currency banking business from the IFSC. The regulations also contemplate IFSC Banking Companies. The defining legal features are that the unit deals in non-rupee currency and operates under the IFSCA’s prudential and conduct rules rather than the RBI’s onshore framework, while remaining tied to its parent for capital and oversight.

4. Fund management: the FME framework

Fund management is governed by the IFSCA (Fund Management) Regulations 2025, notified on 19 February 2025, which replaced the 2022 framework and were themselves amended by the Fund Management (Amendment) Regulations 2026. The regime regulates the manager – the Fund Management Entity (FME) – rather than each fund, and registers an FME in one of three kinds: an Authorised FME (for ventures and certain non-retail schemes), a Registered FME (Non-Retail), and a Registered FME (Retail), with the permissible fund activities widening across the three. A notable legal feature is the recognition of third-party fund management, allowing an FME to manage funds it does not sponsor. The category thresholds and conditions are exactly the kind of detail that moves between amendments, so they should be checked against the current regulations.

5. Capital markets: intermediaries, market infrastructure and listing

The capital-markets space is built from three rulebooks, and one recent change must be noted. Intermediaries – broker-dealers, clearing members, investment bankers, custodians, debenture trustees and the like – are now governed by the IFSCA (Capital Market Intermediaries) Regulations 2025, notified on 11 April 2025, which superseded the 2021 regulations (a point worth flagging, because the 2021 instrument is still widely cited and no longer governs). The exchanges, clearing corporations and depositories – India INX, NSE IFSC and the bullion exchange – are market infrastructure institutions under the IFSCA (Market Infrastructure Institutions) Regulations 2021. And primary issuance and listing on the IFSC exchanges – equity, debt, depository receipts and structured products – runs under the IFSCA (Issuance and Listing of Securities) Regulations 2021.

6. Insurance, finance, leasing, payments and TechFin

Beyond banking and capital markets, the IFSCA’s rulebooks span much of the financial economy. Insurance and reinsurance are carried on through an IFSC Insurance Office (IIO) under the Registration of Insurance Business Regulations 2021, with brokers and other intermediaries separately regulated under the IFSCA (Insurance Intermediary) Regulations 2021 – two distinct regimes that should not be conflated. Finance and leasing sit under the IFSCA (Finance Company) Regulations 2021, which cover lending, factoring and the aircraft and ship leasing for which GIFT has become a hub; the Finance Company (Amendment) Regulations 2026 broadened the available structures, adding special-purpose-vehicle and trust- or corporate-service-provider routes for leasing, and the ship-leasing framework was updated in 2026. Payments are governed by the IFSCA (Payment Services) Regulations 2024 (notified 1 February 2024), and technology and support providers by the IFSCA (TechFin and Ancillary Services) Regulations 2025. Bullion trading runs through the India International Bullion Exchange under the IFSCA (Bullion Exchange) Regulations 2020, and group captive operations under the IFSCA (Global In-House Centres) Regulations 2025. The point is not to memorise the list but to see its shape: a single regulator with a rulebook for each activity.

7. Becoming an IFSC unit: authorisation, registration and the Single Window

An entity carries on business in GIFT as an IFSC unit – ordinarily a company incorporated under the Companies Act 2013, or, for some activities, a branch of a parent (an IBU being the clearest example). It must obtain the IFSCA’s registration or authorisation under the rulebook for its activity; the terminology is rulebook-specific (a fund manager is registered as an FME; a banking unit is licensed), and the status defines what the unit may lawfully do.

The process was streamlined by the Single Window IT System (SWIT), the IFSCA’s online gateway launched in September 2024 and mandatory for applications from 1 October 2024. A single common application now yields the IFSCA registration or authorisation together with the SEZ approval, GST registration and the no-objections of the RBI, SEBI and IRDAI where relevant – the mechanism that turns the “single-window” principle into a single filing. For the adviser, SWIT is where the regulatory framework meets the practical act of authorisation.

8. Where the IFSCA stops and FEMA begins

Finally, the boundary that every GIFT structure straddles. The IFSCA regulates what an entity may do inside the IFSC – the licence it holds and how it must conduct that activity. Whether and how money may cross the boundary into or out of the IFSC is a different question, governed by FEMA and administered by the RBI (and, for securities-side flows, SEBI), because the IFSC is treated as outside India only for exchange-control purposes. The two operate together: a GIFT business must hold the right IFSCA authorisation and route its cross-border flows through a permitted FEMA channel. We set out that boundary in our note on GIFT City and FEMA, and the anti-money-laundering obligations that apply across every unit (the IFSCA’s 2022 AML/CFT guidelines and the PMLA 2002) in our AML in GIFT IFSC note. As the rulebook table shows, the IFSCA’s framework is broad and fast-moving – the instruments named here should be re-checked at the time of use.

AML/CFT obligations (the IFSCA’s 2022 guidelines with the PMLA 2002) apply across all of the above – covered in our separate AML note. Every instrument named here is current to mid-2026; the IFSCA amends its rulebooks frequently, so verify before relying.

Frequently asked questions