Resetting LR numbers for a new financial year — CGST Rule 46

If you are a GST-registered transporter, CGST Rule 46 requires that your LR and invoice numbers be consecutive, serially numbered, and unique per financial year. In plain English: FY 2025-26 LRs and FY 2026-27 LRs must sit in separate series.

Simple in theory. In practice, most operators either let the counter keep climbing past 31 March, or they switch series halfway through the year. Both get flagged in a GSTN audit.

The correct format

The format is straightforward:

SRR/25-26/0001
SRR/25-26/0002
...
SRR/25-26/1250
--- 1 April 2026, new FY ---
SRR/26-27/0001
SRR/26-27/0002

Each FY starts at 0001. The prefix embeds the financial year so the period is obvious at a glance. Uniqueness is enforced on (org, FY, number) so duplicates are impossible.

5 common mistakes

1. Forgetting to reset the counter. 31 March ends at 2340. 1 April continues at 2341. That is a Rule 46 violation, technically.
2. Manual numbering. Two people issue the same number. Duplicate LR, confused party, e-way bill mismatch.
3. Leaving gaps.1001, 1002, 1005. An audit will ask "where did 1003 and 1004 go?".
4. Changing the series mid-year. A new format in September is a mistake — keep the old format until the FY ends, then switch.
5. Overlapping series across trucks. Truck A has 1001, Truck B also has 1001. That becomes a duplicate inside the same org.

How TruckBahi handles it

Every LR stores two fields: lr_number (just the number, like 1001) and lr_fy (the starting year — 2025 for FY 2025-26). A unique constraint sits on (org_id, lr_fy, lr_number), so duplicates in the same FY are impossible at the database level.

You do nothing on 1 April. The system derives the FY from issue_date automatically and the counter starts at 1 (or whichever number you configure). The prefix swaps from SRR/25-26/ to SRR/26-27/ on its own.

Migration tip

When importing old data, set the issue_date correctly — 15 March for a 15 March LR, 5 April for a 5 April one. TruckBahi derives the FY itself. You don’t need to set it manually.