Taxpayers will be required to link their PAN cards with Aadhaar
As you must be aware by now that your Aadhaar card is mandatory for filing income-tax returns from July 1. But now, your Aadhaar will have to be linked to Permanent Account Number or else your PAN will be invalid after December 31.
Over the past few years, the Centre has linked Aadhaar to a growing list of subsidies and schemes. Recently, the ministry of human resource development had announced that the midday meal would no longer be free for those children without an Aadhaar card. However, the government currently has no proposal to link Aadhaar numbers with railway passes. With Aadhaar card connected to the PAN card, and effectively with bank accounts, the government will be now able to track the income and expenditures of millions of Indians each time there is a transaction that involves a bank account.
According to the amendments to the Finance Bill, taxpayers will be required to link their PAN cards with Aadhaar numbers. And for those who have not linked their PAN cards to Aadhaar numbers before the deadline will be deemed invalid. All the taxpayers have been told to have a PAN number to file income tax returns and for those who do not come under the tax slab also use the PAN card as the proof of identity.
Earlier, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said that Aadhaar may become the only identity card in future replacing all other types of identity cards such as Voter ID and PAN, while making it mandatory for filing of Income Tax returns in order to curb tax evasion and frauds.