This paper critically evaluates the proposed Income-tax Code/Income-tax Bill, 2025, in relation to the Income-tax Act, 1961, aiming to determine the extent to which the proposed framework addresses the persistent issues of complexity, excessive cross-referencing, outdated drafting style, and interpretational ambiguity that have gradually developed within India's direct tax system. The reform process officially began with a thorough review aimed at making the law shorter, clearer, and easier to understand. The Income-tax Bill, 2025 was introduced in the Lok Sabha on February 13, 2025, for this reason. Official statements say that the new law keeps most of the core tax policy and basic rules from the 1961 Act, but it focuses mostly on making the language easier to understand, getting rid of old rules, reorganizing the law in a more logical way, and making the structure more coherent. After more parliamentary review, most of the committee's suggestions were accepted, and the new law will go into effect on April 1, 2026. In light of this, the study uses a doctrinal, analytical, and comparative approach to look at both laws in terms of things like how they were written, how they fit together, how easy they are for taxpayers to follow, how much work they make for the government, how easy they are to read, and how likely they are to lead to lawsuits and voluntary compliance. The paper contends that although the proposed 2025 framework signifies a significant legislative modernization initiative and a substantial effort to enhance the accessibility of income-tax law for taxpayers, professionals, and administrators, its true efficacy will hinge not solely on textual simplification but on its success in diminishing ambiguity, maintaining legal certainty, ensuring continuity in interpretation, and bolstering trust in tax administration. The study concludes that the proposed code should be regarded not merely as a substitute for the 1961 Act, but as a structural and jurisprudential reform, the long-term efficacy of which will be assessed based on its practical implementation, interpretive consistency, and enhancement of a more transparent, efficient, and citizen-centric tax system.