Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has, on Thursday, launched the online facility for getting instant allotment of PAN Card using the Aadhaar based e-KYC portal. This facility would issue an electronic PAN (e-PAN) to the applicants at free of cost and in ten minutes. So, those who didn't have a PAN can use this facility and get the allotment in ten minutes.

The facility of instant PAN allotment was one of the Finance Minister's key announcements in the Union Budget and it has come into effect from Thursday. According to the reports, the applicants who have a valid Aadhaar number and possess a valid and registered mobile number in the UIDAI database can use this facility for getting the e-PAN. 

The government has made it as a paperless allotment process and has made it simple for the applicants. The applicants must visit the e-filing website of the Income Tax Department and they must share their Aadhaar number following which they would be receiving the OTP on their Aadhaar registered mobile number. Upon receiving the OTP, they must enter it to complete the process. 

After completing the process, the applicants would be given with a 15 digit acknowledgment number and after the turnaround time, the e-PAN card can be downloaded from the portal by using the acknowledgment number and if the applicants had registered their e-mail in the UIDAI database, the e-PAN would also be sent to their mail ids. 

Although the facility has been launched formally on Thursday, it has been running on a trial basis since February on the e-filing website of the Income Tax department. The IT Department has said that over 6.7 lakh instant PAN cards have been allotted to the taxpayers when the facility was on its trial basis. The Finance Ministry has mandated the taxpayers to link the PAN card with the Aadhaar card by June 30 this year and the PAN, which are unlinked with the Aadhaar, will become inoperative after the current deadline.

Earlier, the deadline was March 31 and the government has deferred the deadline till June in the wake of the COVID-19 lockdown. According to the Income Tax department, out of 49.39 crore individual PAN cards, 32.17 crore had been linked with Aadhaar so far.

How to apply for an instant e-PAN card?

• Visit e-filing website of the Income Tax department - https://www.incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in/home           
•  Click Instant PAN through Aadhaar in Quick links                                                                       
•  Click 'Get New PAN option' and enter your valid Aadhaar card number                                         
•  Enter your Aadhaar registered mobile number, you will receive the OTP                                       
• Submit the OTP for generating an e-PAN card.