Demat account for companies, partnerships and trusts

The plain answer

A company, partnership firm, LLP or trust can hold a demat account in its own name, with its own PAN, operated by authorised signatories. The account belongs to the entity, not to the signatories, which is the distinction every document on the checklist exists to prove. When a company opens the account, the company owns the shares; when a director resigns, the shares stay put. The KYC is built to verify not just a person but a legal structure and the authority inside it.

Entity accounts are document-heavy and usually verified in person. The constitutional documents, the certificate of incorporation, the partnership deed, the trust deed, the LLP agreement, must all be produced, and the people who will operate the account complete KYC as individuals on top of the entity’s own KYC. Two layers of identity, the legal person and the humans acting for it, and both must check out before the account opens.

The practical difference from an individual account is time and discipline. Where an individual account opens in minutes on paperless KYC, an entity account takes days to weeks and runs on consistent paperwork. The sections below cover each structure’s document set, who operates the account, and the ongoing documentation the entity route requires after opening.

The four structures

The table’s last column is the key column. Each structure has one constitutional document that defines who holds authority inside it, and the DP’s review is, at its core, a check that the people named on the account form are the people the document authorises. The rest of the file, PAN, address proof, bank details, is the same identity scaffolding as any account; the constitutional document is what makes it an entity file.

A company is a separate legal person created by incorporation. A partnership firm is an association of partners under a deed, and in many cases it is registered with the Registrar of Firms. An LLP blends the two: a body corporate with limited liability, run by designated partners under an LLP agreement. A trust holds property for beneficiaries under a trust deed, and the trustees operate its accounts. Each is a different legal creature, and the account forms ask which one you are for exactly that reason.

Coverage varies by broker, so confirm before you collect documents. Upstox’s public account-opening page names HUF, LLP and corporate accounts among the non-individual types it supports. Partnership firm and trust accounts are not always advertised on public pages even where they are supported, so a written confirmation from the broker’s support desk is the sensible first step for those structures.

Trusts split into two kinds with different papers. A private trust holds property for named beneficiaries under the Indian Trusts Act, 1882, and its deed is the whole constitution. A public or charitable trust is usually registered under the relevant state law and carries a registration certificate in addition to the deed. Both open the account the same way, the trust’s PAN, the deed, the trustees’ KYC and the bank account in the trust’s name, but the public trust should keep its registration certificate current, because the DP will ask for it at re-KYC too.

Documents by structure

• Company: certificate of incorporation, memorandum and articles of association, board resolution authorising the account and its signatories, PAN, address proof, and KYC of each signatory.
• Partnership: partnership deed, firm PAN, registration certificate where the firm is registered, and KYC of the authorised partners.
• LLP: incorporation document, LLP agreement, designated partner details and their KYC.
• Trust: trust deed, registration certificate where applicable, trustee resolutions where the deed requires them, and trustee KYC.

Two items apply to every structure and are easy to forget. The first is the bank account: funds move in and out through a bank account in the entity’s name, and the DP records that account. The second is the beneficial ownership declaration, which KYC norms require for legal entities: the file must name the natural persons who ultimately own or control the entity, so the identity trail does not stop at the entity’s letterhead.

The board resolution deserves special care because it is the document the account runs on. It should state that the company resolves to open a demat account with the named DP, that the named persons are authorised to sign and operate it, and that the resolution covers the trading account opened alongside. A resolution that only says “accounts may be opened” without naming the people will be sent back, and each resend costs days.

The consistency rule applies across every page: the entity name on the PAN, the constitutional document, the bank account and the account form must match character for character. A deed that says “Sharma & Sons” while the PAN says “Sharma and Sons” stalls the whole file. Check the three names against each other before the first submission, and the review becomes a formality instead of a correspondence.

Copies carry their own convention: the DP usually wants certified true copies, attested by a director, a partner or a trustee with their name, designation and signature, rather than originals or plain photocopies. Self-attestation follows the same rule, sign, stamp and date each copy, and keep one clean master set in the office, because the same documents return at every re-KYC. The master set is the fastest way to make the second submission as quick as the first.

Who operates the account

The operating authority always comes from the entity’s own documents: a board resolution, the deed, or the agreement. The DP does not decide who operates; it verifies that the documents authorise the people named on the form. When signatories change, the same paper trail updates the record, which is why entity accounts carry an ongoing documentation discipline that individual accounts do not.

A signatory change runs in three steps. The entity passes a fresh resolution appointing the new signatory and removing the old one. The new signatory completes individual KYC. The DP updates the account records so the new signatory can operate and the old one cannot. Until step three completes, the old signatory’s instructions remain technically live, which is why a resignation should trigger the resolution immediately, not when it becomes convenient.

The ownership side never changes hands with the signatures. The shares belong to the company, the firm or the trust, and they survive every change of director, partner or trustee. That is also why the nominee question reads differently for entities: where an individual names a person, an entity’s continuity is handled by its own succession mechanics, and the account records simply track the current operators.

Why entity accounts are slower

Three reasons compound. The document set is constitutional, not personal, so every page must match every other page: a deed name that differs from the PAN name stalls the file, and each stall costs a correspondence cycle. Verification is usually in person for the authorised signatories, because the KYC must establish that the real people behind the entity are who the documents say they are. And the DP’s entity desk reviews the structure, which is a human review, not an automated fetch.

The timeline follows from the three reasons. The paperwork assembly takes days if the constitutional documents are current, weeks if a resolution or a certificate needs to be obtained first. The submission and in-person verification take a few working days. The entity desk review takes days to weeks depending on volume and on how clean the file is. The honest budget is one to three weeks for a well-prepared file, and the honest preparation is having every constitutional document consistent before applying.

The sequence also has a natural order for the busy office. Draft the resolution first, because it is the only document that needs a meeting. Photocopy and self-attest the certificates second, because they need the authorised person’s signature. Put the signatory KYC last, because it expires the slowest and any of it that is more than a few months old may be asked to be refreshed. Working in that order means the file waits on the calendar, not on the courier.

How the opening flow runs

• Confirm coverage. Check with the broker that it supports your entity type, in writing if it is a partnership or trust, and ask for its current checklist.
• Assemble the constitutional file. Collect the incorporation documents or deed, the resolution, and the entity PAN. Reconcile the name across PAN, deed and bank account before anything else.
• Signatory KYC. Each authorised signatory completes KYC with PAN, Aadhaar where applicable, photo and address proof. Expect an in-person verification step for the signatories.
• Submit and review. The DP’s entity desk reviews the structure and the authority chain. Queries come back by email; answer them with documents, not explanations.
• Activation. The account opens in the entity’s name with the entity’s PAN. Link the entity bank account, complete any TPIN setup, and record the BO ID in the entity’s books.

One timing note: the trading account usually opens alongside the demat account under the same file, because both belong to the same entity and the same resolution covers both. There is no advantage in opening them separately; the document assembly is the same either way, and a combined submission means one review instead of two.

When a query arrives, answer it with a document, not a paragraph. A reviewer asking for a copy of the resolution wants the resolution, and a one-line email attaching it closes the query in a day. A three-paragraph explanation of the company’s history does not. The fastest entity files are run by people who treat every query as a document request, which is what it almost always is.

Entity account vs individual account

The table explains why the two routes feel like different products. The individual account verifies one person and opens in a sitting. The entity account verifies a structure, its documents and its humans, and every one of those three layers can generate a query. The slower route is not friction; it is the review that keeps the account’s ownership story, the entity owns, the signatories operate, verifiably true.

The operator column carries the practical difference into daily use. In an individual account, the operator and the owner are the same person, so instructions are always unambiguous. In an entity account, instructions arrive from people whose authority has a source document, and the DP will occasionally check that document again. That is the ongoing documentation discipline described in the next section.

Running the account after opening

Entity accounts renew their paperwork on a schedule. KYC norms require periodic re-verification for accounts, and entity files get the same treatment with the added weight of the constitutional documents. Keep the incorporation certificates, registration certificates and deeds current and retrievable, because a re-KYC request arrives years after opening and expects the same consistency the first review demanded.

Three events inside the entity trigger account updates: a change of signatories, which needs the fresh resolution and new KYC described above; a change of the entity’s registered address, which needs updated proof and updated records; and a change of bank mandate, which needs the new bank details in the entity’s name. Each is a paperwork event, and none of them is automatic, so treat them as part of the corporate calendar, not as chores.

On taxes, the account reports under the entity’s PAN, and the capital gains rates that apply to listed equity, 20% on short-term gains under section 111A and 12.5% above ₹1.25 lakh on long-term gains under section 112A, apply to companies as they do to individuals under the post-July-2024 rules. Dividends are taxed in the entity’s hands at its applicable rate. How the gains fit the entity’s overall tax computation is your tax advisor’s work. DematOpen is an Authorized Person of Upstox and does not provide investment advice.

What people usually get wrong

Questions people ask

Sources

• National Securities Depository Limited. “Official website — depository services.” Accessed 16 August 2026.
• Central Depository Services (India) Limited. “Official website — demat account services.” Accessed 16 August 2026.
• Upstox. “Open a free Demat account,” types of demat account. Accessed 16 August 2026.
• Securities and Exchange Board of India. “Legal framework — circulars.” Accessed 16 August 2026.