Under the provisions of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (“the Act”), every person who has been allotted a PAN as on 1st July, 2017 and is eligible to obtain Aadhaar Number, is required to intimate his Aadhaar to the prescribed authority on or before 31st March, 2022. On failure to do so, his PAN shall become inoperative and all procedures in which PAN is required shall be halted. The PAN can be made operative again upon intimation of Aadhaar to the prescribed authority after payment of a prescribed fee.

In order to mitigate the inconvenience to the taxpayers, as per Notification No.17/2022 dated 29th March, 2022, a window of opportunity has been provided to the taxpayers upto 31st of March, 2023 to intimate their Aadhaar to the prescribed authority for Aadhaar-PAN linking without facing repercussions. As a result, taxpayers will be required to pay a fee of ₹ 500 up to three months from 1st April, 2022 and a fee of ₹ 1000 after that, while intimating their Aadhaar.

However, till 31st March, 2023 the PAN of the assessees who have not intimated their Aadhaar, will continue to be functional for the procedures under the Act, like furnishing of return of income, processing of refunds etc. A detailed Circular No.7/2022 dated 30.03.2022 has also been issued in this regard.

After 31st March, 2023, the PAN of taxpayers who fail to intimate their Aadhaar, as required, shall become inoperative and all the consequences under the Act for not furnishing, intimating or quoting the PAN shall apply to such taxpayers.

Aadhaar-PAN linking requirement: failure to intimate Aadhaar within the compliance window will render PAN inoperative thereafter. A transitional compliance window until 31 March 2023 permits assessees eligible for Aadhaar who have not intimated it to keep PAN functional for tax procedures while allowing Aadhaar-PAN linking on payment of a prescribed fee; after the window, failure to intimate Aadhaar will render PAN inoperative and attendant statutory consequences for non furnishing or non quoting of PAN will apply.