With Aadhaar now mandatory for filing income tax returns and for Permanent Account Numbers (PAN), the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has asked its officials to ensure that personal data of taxpayers is not leaked.

“It is requested that any act of publishing the personal identity or information like Aadhaar number and demographic details along with personal sensitive information such as bank details, in contravention of the Aadhaar Act 2016 and the Information Technology Act, 2000 be refrained with immediate effect,” said the CBDT in an internal circular.

About 1.11 crore of the over 24.6 crore PAN cards have already been linked with Aadhaar. It also stressed that any such information that may already have been published must be withdrawn immediately and the order must be followed in future as well.

The move follows a recent letter by the Department of Electronics and Information Technology to all nodal Ministries that personal and financial information of beneficiaries receiving welfare under various schemes must not be published.

In a bid to curb tax evasion, the government, in the amendments of the Finance Act, 2017, has made it mandatory from this fiscal to quote the 12-digit biometric authentication number for filing income tax returns.

Aadhaar seeding of PAN cards is also mandatory and all PAN cards without the Aadhaar number will be considered invalid after July 1.

With many considering it an infringement of their privacy to provide details of their biometrics for filing taxes, the issue is now being heard by the Supreme Court after three public interest litigations were filed.

Aadhaar data of beneficiaries under some schemes were also published online in recent times but were later removed.

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