Duplicate PAN card holders total 13 lakh

New Delhi, Sep 1 (UNI) The government has identified 13 lakh duplicate PAN card holders, who face the risk of a penalty of Rs 10,000 each.

A Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) Spokesman today made a fervent appeal to these assessees to surrender their duplicate PAN numbers and warned those who are indulging in such activities that it was now relatively easy for the government to track such cases in view of the Centralised Information System.

The spokesman said under Article 272 B of the Income Tax Act, a penalty of Rs 10,000 can be imposed, but was hopeful that the government would not need to take recource to this due to voluntary compliance.

The spokesman said the government has been able to recover Rs 400 crore as a result of the Banking Transaction Tax and indicated that eight to ten major cases were under investigation in this regard.

The spokesman, however, refused to divulge these cases but added that in one case, an amount of Rs 4.8 crore was surrendered.

The spokesman said that as a result of the Annual Information Report (AIR), the government has been able to track 18 lakhs pieces of inforation.

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