How to avail e-PAN instantly by furnishing Aadhaar?

Union Finance Minister, Nirmala Sitharaman, in her budget speech had proposed to launch a system under which an applicant can get the Permanent Account Number (PAN) online by furnishing the Aadhaar details.

The proposal was made in order to ease the process of allotment of PAN and save an individual or other entity from filling the PAN application form and submitting it to the tax authorities in order to get the 10-character alphanumeric identifier. It would also help the Income Tax department in eliminating the time, cost, and effort involved in sending physical copies of the document to the applicant’s address.

As per Revenue Secretary Ajay Bhushan Pandey, the facility will be rolled out by the government by the end of February as the system is being put in place. This brings us to the question as to how one can go about getting the e-PAN by providing the Aadhaar details. Read on to know about the procedure:

First, the applicant will need to visit the income tax website.
There, he/she will need to enter the 12-digit Aadhaar number.
Once done, a one-time password (OTP) will be sent on the registered mobile number.
The applicant will need to enter the OTP on the space provided.
Following that, the Aadhaar details will be verified
If the details are successfully verified, the e-PAN will be allotted instantly.
The applicant can download the document from the website.

It needs to be mentioned here that the government has made the linking of PAN and Aadhaar mandatory and to date, over 30.75 crore PANs have been linked to Aadhaar. With the last date for the linking being 31 March, over 17.58 crore PANs are yet to be linked as per official data.

The Permanent Account Number is issued by the Income Tax department under Section 139A of the Income Tax Act, 1961. It is a combination of alphabets and numbers and is provided by the department under the supervision of the Central Board of Direct Taxes and it serves as a proof of identification.