One of my friends recently asked me about where should he invest some of his savings ($300) and I suggested him bitcoins. He talked me next day and told me that bitcoins are illegal. Currently, there is are lot of misconceptions about bitcoin investment in India. Let me make everything clear:
1) This started with the recent yearly budget announced where the Finance minister said that bitcoins are not legal currency in India. Media left the currency word here and we saw news like bitcoins are not legal in India. It is completely legal and you can invest without any issues. It is not a legal currency and this means that you cannot do offline transactions with bitcoins in India.
2) There was news that some banks blocked credit cards of people using it for bitcoin transactions. I am using my cards and bank transfer for bitcoin investment without any problems so this is also a rumor.
3) Income tax notices are being sent to all bitcoin investors is another misconception. Notices were sent but only to those who are investing huge money and not paying taxes.
Let us discuss more misconceptions here and I will answer in replies.
More and more countries are declaring bitcoins to be legally used as a form of payment. Among the list India is not alone, we have Japan, South Korea and Philippines in Asia. Plus, there are a lot more countries on the western side. But majority of countries does not have any declaration about bitcoin thus people are still using it.