New Delhi: The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) stated on Monday that new protocols have been put in place by it which will ensure the allotment of PAN and TAN (Tax Deduction Account Number) to corporates within a day. Interacting with reporters here, CBDT Chairman Atulesh Jindal stated that facility to apply for TAN using digital signatures for corporates and Aadhaar-based e-signature facility for individuals to obtain PAN have been introduced by the Income Tax Department recently. This will lead to a reduction of the effective time utilized in the allotment of the unique I-T department issued number by half.
“CBDT has agreed to a seamless exchange of data with Ministry of Corporate Affairs to ensure that upon incorporation of a company by MCA the PAN and TAN number are allotted within a day. The process of getting a PAN or TAN has been fast-tracked for all category of taxpayers,” he said.
Mr. Jindal said the objective of the new measures is to ensure “ease of doing business in the country” and help taxpayers in obtaining PAN quickly.
The PAN number has been made the unique business identifier for all different categories of businesses not only for assessees of the Income Tax department but also for other organizations.”
“We have taken certain steps for easing the allotment of the PAN number and TAN the process has been made totally digitized. Besides this, the corporate assessees who are filing applications on the e-Biz platform and the corporate who is coming to us for allotment of PAN, now such a corporate can file such an application online using the digital signature. No physical document is required to be attached along with the application,” he said.
The chief of CBDT said that these processes have also been digitized for normal taxpayers and those in the non-corporate category. “They (taxpayers) can also file the application without any annexure using a digital signature. Besides that, we have also introduced another facility, a convenient facility for those who do not have a digital signature. They can file using Aadhaar-based e-signature facility,” Mr. Jindal said while talking about processes that will be available to individuals seeking a PAN.
In a move aimed at improving ease of doing business, as many as 20 central government services including industrial license and employer registration have been integrated with the e-Biz platform.
The e-Biz project commenced with the aim to provide government services through a single-window portal.
Till now, on the e-Biz portal about crore Aadhaar numbers have been linked with the I-T department issued Permanent Account Number (PAN).
“A senior I-T official said the e-signature needed for obtaining PAN using Aadhaar can be obtained in a one-time fashion by a taxpayer and it will cost around Rs 5-7.”
“These measures will simplify things. In this e-Biz portal, we have prioritized everything. The time that is being cut is with regard to the submission of the physical documents for obtaining PAN or TAN by any category of taxpayer, whether corporate or individual,” the official said.
He said over the last few years, the department has weeded out over 11 lakh duplicate PANs and the possibility of issuing one person with two PANs is remote now.
As per the statistics gathered for direct tax collections, a growth of 24.79 % to Rs 1.24 lakh crore was registered during April-June period mainly on account of early advance tax mop-up however, it was acknowledged by Mr. Jindal that these numbers are “not the actual indicator” of revenue collections. He said that at present TDS (tax deducted at source) collections are showing a growth of more than 16-17%
“Only concern for us today is the corporate sector collection. That is not up to the mark. Personal income tax has shown a very good growth,” he said.
Mr. Jindal said the tax department is using non-intrusive methods and technology and is “very very serious” about increasing the tax base.
He continued that with the help of Non-filers Management System (NMS), a special electronic project developed to identify non-filers or stop-filers, over a crore taxpayers has been identified by the I-T department and Rs 6,000 crore in taxes were collected last year.
“We get information from various sources and under different heads under the NMS and we are making this system more robust,” the CBDT chief added.