Direct Taxation

CBDT Notifies PAN-Aadhaar Interchangeability

07.11.2019

The Central Board of Direct Taxes, a statutory authority, has notified the amendments of over 100 forms and returns to provide for interchangeability between permanent account number (PAN) and Aadhaar Number. The Union Budget presented in July, 2019 had amended Section 139A of the Income-tax Act, 1961 to provide for interchangeability of PAN and Aadhaar number for income tax purposes.

In exercise of the powers conferred by Section 139A, read with Section 295 of the IT Act, the Central Board of Direct Taxes makes rules further to amend the Income-tax Rules, 1962. CBDT has now amended the Income-tax Rules, 1962 (Rules), which means a person can use his or her Aadhaar number instead of PAN in various forms and documents. As per Explanatory Memorandum, it is also clarified that, no person is being adversely affected by giving retrospective effect to the amendment rules. The amended Rules, 1962 will apply to various forms and words and letters ‘Permanent Account Number’, in the rules will be substituted by the words ‘Permanent Account Number or Aadhaar Number.

Section 139AA(1) of the IT Act, as introduced by the Finance Act, 2017 provides for mandatory quoting of Aadhaar/Enrolment ID of Aadhaar application form, for filing of return of income and for making an application for allotment of PAN with effect from 1st July, 2017. Section 139AA(2) of the IT Act, stipulates that every person who has been allotted PAN as on the 1st day of July, 2017, and who is eligible to obtain Aadhaar, shall intimate his Aadhaar on or before a date to be notified by the Central Government. The proviso to Section 139AA (2) provides that, in case of non-intimation of Aadhaar, the PAN allotted to the person shall be deemed to be invalid from a date to be notified by the Central Government. Linkage of Aadhaar number into PAN database will allow a robust way of de-duplication as Aadhaar number is based on biometric attributes of finger prints and iris images. Further, seeding of Aadhaar will allow the Income-tax Department to weed out any undetected duplicate PANs.

Tags : PAN Aadhaar Linakage Notification

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