Not property rent: net, with no 30% deduction
First, what equipment hire is not. Renting out machinery, plant, furniture or equipment is not income from house property, so the flat 30% standard deduction that a property landlord enjoys does not apply. Instead, under Section 56, letting out plant, machinery or furniture is income from other sources, unless it is carried on as a business, in which case it is business income. Either way, it is taxed on your net: you deduct the actual expenses of the letting, and depreciation on the equipment, and pay tax on the profit.
So compared with property rent, the trade is that you lose the generous 30% flat deduction but you can claim your real costs and depreciation. For a purely domestic situation, that is the whole story. For an NRI, it is not, because a separate rule can override this entirely.
The royalty override, and the TDS
Here is the cross-border twist that catches non-residents. Where a non-resident is paid for the use of, or the right to use, industrial, commercial or scientific equipment, that payment is treated as royalty under the deeming rules, not as ordinary rent. And royalty to a non-resident is taxed on a gross basis at a flat rate, often the reduced royalty rate under your country's treaty, rather than on your net rental profit after expenses.
So the domestic answer, net rent taxed as other income, and the non-resident answer, gross royalty at a flat rate, genuinely diverge, and which applies depends on the nature of the arrangement. That matters because a gross flat rate with no expenses can be better or worse than net-at-slab depending on your margins, so it is worth working out. On the withholding, the resident rent section, which deducts at 2% for plant and machinery, does not apply to you; a non-resident lessor's TDS is under Section 195, at the royalty or applicable rate, and only where the income is chargeable in India. There is also 18% GST on equipment hire, separate from income tax. A practising CA works out whether your equipment income is net rent or gross royalty, applies the better and correct basis, and sets the Section 195 withholding right.