On Friday, the Supreme Court questioned the Centre as to why the Aadhar card was being mandated for Income Tax filing. The SC asked why a law was enacted that made it mandate to link the Aadhar Card with the PAN card for Income Tax returns filing from the fiscal year of 2018-19.
The Bench of Justices K. Sikri and Ashok Bhushan asked the Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi if this law was so as to provide a solution to the duplication of PAN cards. A petition was filed by Binoy Viswam, CPI National Executive Member and former Kerala Minister, which the bench was hearing. Viswam challenged the Section 139 AA that was introduced which states Aadhar card must be linked to PAN Card for filing returns.
The Attorney General said to the bench, “we brought the land to introduce Section 139AA of the Income Tax Act as we found that same person is having more than one PAN number.” To this, the Justice Sikri asked the AG, “Is this the remedy? Forcibly asking people to get Aadhaar cards when this court has already said Aadhaar is not mandatory.”
The AG Rohatgi said that court might have passed an order before the introduction of Aadhar card. But now there is a law that has been enacted and legislative mandate in place already. He said that this law was passed so as to put an end to fake PAN cards and ration cards that have been reigning the market. The AG also said the SC had passed recently the Aadhar was important to document and must be presented to procure SIM cards from now on. He asked the SC, “Why the change in the decision now?”
