Section 80DD and 80U Deduction 2026: ₹75,000 to ₹1.25 Lakh for Disability — and the New Rule That Can Get Your Claim Rejected

Most disability-linked tax breaks require medical bills proving you actually spent the money. Sections 80DD and 80U (now Sections 127 and 154 of the Income-tax Act, 2025) don't — they hand out a fixed deduction of ₹75,000 or ₹1,25,000 purely on the basis of a certified disability, whether the family spent that full amount on care that year or not. That generosity is exactly why the paperwork around it has tightened: since returns for AY 2025-26, the certificate alone isn't enough — its acknowledgement number needs to be on record too, or the claim gets kicked back.

80U vs 80DD — Whose Disability, Whose Deduction

The two sections mirror each other in amount and rules, but you can't mix and match on the same person. If you claim 80U for your own disability, no other taxpayer — not even a parent who genuinely supports you — can simultaneously claim 80DD for you as their dependant in the same year. Numbering: for FY 2025-26 income the rules are in Sections 80U and 80DD of the 1961 Act; from FY 2026-27 they are Section 154 (80U) and Section 127 (80DD) of the 2025 Act, with the same ₹75,000 and ₹1,25,000 amounts, and Section 154(2)(c) requires the certificate to be furnished in the prescribed form and manner along with the return under Section 263.

How Much You Can Actually Claim

Old Regime Only

Both sections sit on the list of deductions explicitly blocked under the new tax regime introduced under Section 115BAC (now Section 202). If you've moved to the new regime — now the default unless you actively opt out — 80DD and 80U aren't available at all, regardless of how severe the certified disability is. This is one more entry on the list of deductions the new regime trades away for lower slab rates, alongside Section 24(b) on let-out property (now Section 22) and LTA exemption.

The New Rule That Can Get Your Claim Rejected

Both deductions have always needed a valid disability certificate from a recognised medical authority — a civil surgeon or chief medical officer at a government hospital, or, for autism, cerebral palsy, and multiple disability specifically, a neurologist or paediatric neurologist using Form 10-IA. What's changed starting with returns for AY 2025-26 is that holding the certificate is no longer enough on the ITR form itself: the return now requires the certificate's filing date and acknowledgement number to be entered in Schedule 80DD or Schedule 80U before the deduction is accepted. A genuine, valid certificate filed the old way — without that acknowledgement number on record — risks the claim being flagged or disallowed at processing, on a paperwork mismatch rather than any question about the disability itself.

Don't Confuse This With Section 80DDB

80DD and 80U are about a certified disability itself — a fixed amount, no bills needed. Section 80DDB (now Section 128) is a different deduction, for the actual cost of treating specified critical illnesses like cancer, chronic kidney failure, or Parkinson's, capped at ₹1,00,000 (₹40,000 under age 60) and based on real expenditure, not a flat certificate-based figure. A taxpayer treating a parent's cancer claims 80DDB; a taxpayer supporting a sibling with a certified 60% disability claims 80DD. See our Section 80DDB guide for how that expense-based deduction works.

If you're an HUF exploring what else it can claim beyond this, our HUF tax benefits guide covers how a Hindu Undivided Family's own ₹1.5 lakh Section 80C (now Section 123) bucket and deductions like this one work as a genuinely separate layer of planning. And since 80DD and 80U sit outside the ₹1.5 lakh 80C ceiling entirely, our NSC vs PPF vs ELSS comparison is a good next stop if you're separately trying to fill that ₹1.5 lakh bucket in the same financial year.