Government collects Rs 600 crore in Aadhaar-PAN linking penalties

The government has collected over Rs 600 crore as penalties from persons who failed to meet the deadline for linking their PAN (permanent account number) with their Aadhaar cards, Parliament was told on Monday.

Minister of state for finance Pankaj Chaudhary told the Lok Sabha, in a written reply, that the number of PANs not linked with Aadhaar, excluding exempted categories, is 11.48 crore as of 29 January 2024.

The deadline for linking PAN and Aadhaar was 30 June 2023. The Income Tax department had stated in its order that PAN cards would become inoperative if taxpayers failed to link their documents with Aadhaar within the deadline. Moreover, no refunds would be made against such PANs. Failure to link the PAN with the biometric document would also attract a higher TDS and TCS.

The PAN can be made operative again by paying a penalty late fee of Rs 1,000.