Halal Gold ETF in India: Gold BeES, SGBs & Digital Gold

Last updated: October 26, 2026

SEBI's rules let gold ETFs put up to 20% of assets into bank gold deposit and monetisation schemes, which pay interest. They can also hold up to 50% in gold-related instruments, futures included.¹ The label won't tell you which kind you're buying. Each fund's monthly portfolio will. Sovereign Gold Bonds pay 2.5% interest a year and are not halal. Electronic Gold Receipts are the closest Indian product to owning allocated gold.

The Shariah rules behind this page are covered in detail in is gold ETF halal?. For silver funds outside India, see halal silver ETFs. For every route into precious metals, see halal gold and precious metals.

The Shariah test for any gold product

AAOIFI Shariah Standard 57 treats ETF units "whose entire assets are gold" exactly like gold (clause 10/3), and applies the same rules to silver (clause 10/1).⁴ In plain terms, a gold product is halal when:

1. It's backed by physical, allocated gold: specific bars, not a general claim on some gold (clauses 3/4 and 3/5).
2. You buy it spot, in full, with cash. No delayed delivery and no margin (clauses 3/2/1 and 3/2/2).
3. It earns no interest on the gold or on the cash behind it.
4. It doesn't use futures or other derivatives to get its exposure.

Indian products mostly trip up on the last two.

Which gold ETF is halal in India?

Indian gold ETFs are SEBI-regulated mutual fund schemes that keep 99.5%-pure physical gold in vaults. For a Muslim investor, what matters is what else they're allowed to hold:⁵¹

• Banks' Gold Deposit Scheme and Gold Monetisation Scheme, up to 20% of assets. Both pay interest on the gold you deposit, so any holding here earns interest.
• Exchange-traded commodity derivatives (gold futures), inside a 50% cap on all gold-related instruments. The bank schemes count toward that cap too.
• Short-term bank deposits and tri-party repo (TREPS) for cash waiting to be invested. Both pay interest.

That's what the rules allow. In practice, most large gold ETFs hold almost nothing but gold bars. Nippon India ETF Gold BeES, the biggest, held 98.35% in 1 kg gold bars of 995 purity and 1.65% in cash and receivables on 30 September 2026. Its tri-party repo position was effectively 0.00%.²

How to check a specific gold ETF

Every AMC (the fund company) publishes a monthly portfolio disclosure on its website. Open the latest one and look for these lines:

Say a fund holds gold bars plus a fraction of a percent in repo. The common scholarly approach is the same one used for stocks with tiny interest income: invest, then donate the matching share of the interest (that's called purification). If a fund has a real chunk in a monetisation scheme or in futures, pick another fund. India has more than a dozen gold ETFs, and their portfolios are close to identical.

One gap to flag: we didn't find an Indian gold ETF with its own Shariah board or certificate. Nippon India ETF Shariah BeES is an equity ETF of Shariah-screened Indian stocks. It holds no gold.

Is Gold BeES halal?

On its 30 September 2026 portfolio, yes on structure. Nippon India ETF Gold BeES invests "exclusively in physical gold" of 99.5% purity, though its stated philosophy also allows money market instruments.² That month it was 98.35% gold bars and 1.65% cash and receivables.² The scheme documents still allow the SEBI-permitted instruments listed above, so check the latest monthly portfolio before you buy.

Are Sovereign Gold Bonds halal?

No. A Sovereign Gold Bond (SGB) is a Government of India bond whose value tracks the gold price. It pays 2.5% a year in interest, credited every six months, and matures after eight years.⁶ You don't own any gold. You hold a rupee debt the government owes you, plus fixed interest. That interest is riba, and linking the bond to gold doesn't change that.

No new SGB tranches have come out since February 2024, but existing bonds still trade on NSE and BSE.⁶ Buy one on the exchange and you get the same interest-bearing bond.

If you already hold SGBs:

1. Don't buy more.
2. Give the interest you receive to charity, without expecting reward for it. This is purification, not sadaqah.
3. Get out at a premature redemption window or sell on the exchange. RBI allows early redemption after five years, on interest dates, and publishes the redemption calendar every six months.⁶
4. If you still want gold, move the money into a physically backed gold ETF or an EGR.

Is digital gold halal?

Digital gold is gold you buy in small amounts through payment and investing apps. The provider buys the gold and stores it in a vault for you. If the provider really does allocate vaulted gold to your account when you pay, the Shariah structure can work. The trouble is everything around it.

First, SEBI doesn't regulate it. In November 2025 SEBI warned that digital gold products "are neither notified as securities nor regulated as commodity derivatives" and "operate entirely outside the purview of SEBI," which leaves buyers open to "counterparty and operational risks."³ SEBI-registered brokers and advisers haven't been allowed to sell it since 2021.⁷

Second, you're relying on the platform's own terms to tell you whether your gold is allocated, audited and deliverable. There's no monthly portfolio to read, the way there is with a mutual fund.

Our view: digital gold isn't haram by nature, but it's the weakest option on this page. A gold ETF or EGR gets you the same exposure, with a regulator watching.

Electronic Gold Receipts (EGRs)

EGRs come closest to Standard 57's model of owning allocated gold. The Government of India notified them as securities in December 2021. You trade them on the stock exchange's EGR segment, and they sit in your demat account.⁸

Under SEBI's EGR framework:⁸

• A SEBI-registered vault manager creates an EGR only against physical gold of LBMA or India Good Delivery standard that's been deposited in its vault.
• "No EGR is created without the presence of corresponding physical gold in its vaults."
• Vault managers and depositories regularly check EGRs against the physical gold.
• You can convert EGRs back into physical gold.

On structure, that's strong. The practical downside is that the EGR segment is newer and trades far less than gold ETFs, so check volumes and spreads before you trade. That's our guess for a young market. We haven't measured it.

Halal silver ETF in India

SEBI has allowed silver ETFs since November 2021. The rules:⁹

• At least 95% of assets in silver and silver-related instruments.
• Physical silver in 30 kg LBMA Good Delivery bars of 99.9% purity.
• Silver futures (ETCDs) capped at 10% of assets, unless the fund plans to take physical delivery.
• Uninvested cash can go into short-term deposits with scheduled commercial banks.

So you run the same check as with gold. Open the monthly portfolio and look for silver bars, small cash balances, and any futures or deposits. A silver ETF that's almost all bars passes the structure test, and one that holds silver futures doesn't. We found no Shariah certificate for Silver BeES or any other Indian silver ETF, so the portfolio check is the only test you've got.

Gold mutual funds and fund-of-funds

A gold "fund-of-funds" invests in the same AMC's gold ETF, and some also hold debt or TREPS to keep cash on hand. You pay a second expense ratio on top of the ETF's. Got a demat account? Buy the gold ETF directly. If you need a SIP and don't have demat, check the fund-of-funds portfolio for debt holdings.

Can I buy US gold ETFs from India?

Yes. Resident Indians can invest abroad through the RBI's Liberalised Remittance Scheme, using brokers that offer US markets. GLDM, the cheapest physically backed US gold ETF, charges 0.10% a year.¹⁰ For small amounts, though, currency conversion, remittance costs and tax collected at source usually eat up that saving. Most Indian investors are better off with a domestic gold ETF that's almost all gold bars.

Halal gold investment in India: a summary

Gold is a hedge. It won't grow your money the way businesses do. And if you also invest in stocks or index funds, that's usually where the bigger Shariah question sits. Amal Invest builds Shariah-screened versions of popular funds so that part is halal too.

FAQ

Is gold ETF halal in India?

It can be. An Indian gold ETF is halal on structure when its latest portfolio is almost all physical gold, with no bank gold-deposit or monetisation schemes and no gold futures. Most large gold ETFs pass. SEBI rules still allow up to 20% in interest-paying bank schemes, though, so check the monthly portfolio.¹

Is Silver BeES halal?

Check its latest monthly portfolio. A silver ETF that holds LBMA Good Delivery silver bars and only small cash balances meets the AAOIFI structure test. If it holds silver futures, which SEBI allows up to 10% of assets, it doesn't.⁹

Is SGB halal?

No. Sovereign Gold Bonds pay a fixed 2.5% interest a year and give you a government debt, not gold.⁶ If you already hold them, donate the interest and get out at a redemption window.

Is digital gold halal?

It can be, if the provider allocates real, vaulted gold to you when you pay. But digital gold is outside SEBI regulation, and SEBI has warned about counterparty and operational risk.³ A gold ETF or EGR is the safer halal route.

Do I pay zakat on gold ETFs in India?

Yes. On your zakat date, add up the market value of your gold ETF units, your EGRs and any gold jewellery you keep as savings. If your total zakatable wealth is above the nisab (the minimum wealth before zakat is due), pay 2.5%. See zakat on stocks for how to combine this with your shares.

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