Pick the location first: a lane with homes and no shop within easy walking distance matters more than anything you stock. Register under your state's shops and establishments law and get your municipality's trade licence, an FSSAI Registration for selling packaged food (Rs 100 a year for a retailer up to Rs 1.5 crore turnover), free Udyam registration, and GST once you cross Rs 40 lakh turnover in most states. Fund the fit-out and opening stock with savings or a MUDRA loan, Kishore up to Rs 5 lakh or Tarun up to Rs 10 lakh. Buy from your area's distributors and compare prices on B2B apps like Udaan, and take orders on WhatsApp with UPI payments and home delivery, since quick-commerce apps now deliver groceries in minutes. Listing through an ONDC seller app adds online orders without building an app. What kills most kiranas is credit: udhaar given freely to neighbours locks up the cash you need to restock, so set a limit from the first day and write every rupee down.
The FSSAI's current table of which food business needs which licence and what it costs a year, revised from 1 April 2026: most businesses up to Rs 1.5 crore turnover need only a Registration at Rs 100, a State Licence costs Rs 5,000 up to Rs 50 crore, and a Central Licence Rs 7,500 above that. Importers, merchant exporters and businesses registered as e-commerce need a Central Licence whatever their size, and hawkers pay nothing.
The four MUDRA loan bands for a micro business, given through banks and NBFCs: Shishu up to Rs 50,000, Kishore up to Rs 5 lakh, Tarun up to Rs 10 lakh and Tarun Plus up to Rs 20 lakh.
This is the plain-language answer to "do I have to register yet." It lays out the 40 lakh goods / 20 lakh services limits, the lower special-category-state limits, and a state-by-state table so you can check your own state instead of guessing. It also lists the 11 categories (interstate supply, e-commerce sellers, casual and non-resident taxable persons) where registration is mandatory from rupee one, which is the trap most first-time founders miss.
From
ClearTaxby ClearTax Editorial Team12 min read
Standard limits are 40 lakh turnover for goods and 20 lakh for services, dropping to 20/10 lakh in special category states, computed on aggregate turnover across the same PAN.
Interstate supply and selling on marketplaces like Amazon or Flipkart force registration regardless of turnover, so "I'm still small" does not exempt you.
Aggregate turnover counts taxable, exempt, export and interstate supplies together, so businesses often cross the line sooner than they expect.
The government's only portal for registering a micro, small or medium enterprise. It states registration is free and lists the revised limits: a micro enterprise has investment up to ₹2.5 crore and turnover up to ₹10 crore, a small one up to ₹25 crore and ₹100 crore.
A B2B marketplace where small retailers order stock from brands and wholesalers with delivery to the shop, an alternative or addition to the local distributor.
If ONDC is your opening, this is the primary source for how the network actually works and how to join it, including initiatives aimed at startups. Going to the source keeps you ahead of second-hand summaries as the network evolves. Use it to move from reading about the opportunity to actually building on it.
