Guides for Indian therapy practices
Practical guides to the questions a private practice in India actually runs into: whether GST applies to therapy fees, how to pay an associate therapist and whether TDS applies, what clinical supervision requires, how long to keep client records, and what changes when you take on a second therapist.
Each one works from the Act, the notification or the syllabus itself and quotes it, so you can check us. Where the law does not give a clean answer we say so rather than inventing one.
Going from a solo practice to a group in India
What actually changes when you take on your second therapist: who the client contracts with, who holds the record, what you owe them, what supervision you take on, and the thresholds that start counting the day you hire.
Law stated as at 1 September 2026
Paying associate therapists in India
Employee or contractor, what TDS actually applies now that the Income-tax Act 1961 has been repealed, why most small practices owe no TDS at all, and why the direction a revenue split flows can cost a therapist over a lakh a year in unrecoverable GST.
Law stated as at 1 September 2026
Clinical supervision in India
Who is actually required to have supervision in India, which is fewer people than you think, what the RCI hour counts really measure, what a supervision agreement and log should contain, and why supervision fees are almost certainly taxable when therapy is not.
Law stated as at 1 September 2026
How long to keep client records in India
No Indian law sets a retention period for a psychotherapist, and the three-year figure everyone quotes does not bind one. What actually governs it, how the DPDP Act erasure duty interacts with keeping a defensible record, and a retention schedule you can justify.
Law stated as at 1 September 2026
GST on therapy and counselling in India
When therapy fees are exempt from GST in India, when they are not, and the registration trap that catches practices whose therapy income is entirely exempt. Sourced to the notification text, with the unresolved parts marked as unresolved.
Law stated as at 1 September 2026
The software behind these guides
We wrote these because we had to solve the same problems to build Therapist & Co., a practice management platform for mental health professionals in India. What it does depends on the shape of your practice:
- A practice with several therapists · What changes when a practice has more than one therapist: per-therapist payouts, role-scoped access to clinical records, supervision, and the money and reporting that come with employing people.
- A solo practice · One price for the whole practice, not per seat. Scheduling, client records, clinical notes, invoicing in rupees, a public booking page, and the data-protection tooling a solo Data Fiduciary needs.
Pricing is public, in rupees, with no commission taken on your session fees.
Corrections
If you spot an error in any guide, or you have data that would let us replace an absence with a fact, write to collective@therapistandco.com and we will correct it and date the correction.