The recent Supreme Court ruling in the Tiger Global matter marks
a decisive shift in Indian international tax jurisprudence, which
for over a decade had been shaped by the Court's landmark
decision in Vodafone International Holdings BV v. Union of India
(2012). The Vodafone era entrenched the primacy of legal form,
situs of shares and treaty protection in offshore exit
transactions, effectively enabling large-scale exits of
India-centric businesses without Indian capital gains taxation,
provided the transaction was structured through treaty-protected
offshore jurisdictions.
The Tiger Global judgment signals a clear doctrinal departure
from this legacy. More than a dispute confined to capital gains,
the ruling represents a jurisprudential re-orientation of Indian
international tax law — from form-based situs analysis to a
value-based, substance-driven and source-centric framework. This
article examines the judgment's implications for offshore
exits, treaty planning,
